


Oceanlorn

by softjohndae



Series: Stories Sung in the Sunken Sailor's Inn [3]
Category: Stray Kids (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Pirate, Angst, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Pirates, Supernatural Elements, though they're not very piratey in this one
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-30
Updated: 2020-11-13
Packaged: 2021-03-08 23:29:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 39,929
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27284947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softjohndae/pseuds/softjohndae
Summary: Three years of longing. Three years of yearning. Three years of loving.Minho finds his way home.
Relationships: Han Jisung | Han/Lee Minho | Lee Know
Series: Stories Sung in the Sunken Sailor's Inn [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1706935
Comments: 122
Kudos: 255





	1. Year one: Healing

**Author's Note:**

> Can you hear the calling of the waves? It's the Oceanbound realm calling you back! 
> 
> This work is part of the Stories Sung in the Sunken Sailor's Inn series, also known as the Oceanbound realm. However, even if this fic is part of that series, it is written in such way that you can read this without further knowledge of the Oceanbound realm. There will be some things that you most likely won't understand or notice without prior knowledge, but all the important things have been explained in this fic. BUT! If you plan on reading Oceanbound, then I suggest you read that first at least until to Chapter 31, and only after that you return to this work, just to avoid all the important plot twists. 
> 
> This fic consists of three chapters and an epilogue, and the third chapter and the epilogue will be posted at the same time. I will be updating this next friday, and the friday after that, so you won't have to wait for the entire thing to be out for too long! 
> 
> And with that, let's dive deep into the jungle and get to know our little witch and his company a little better!

Minho had seen this coming. He had known it, he had seen it in a dream, he had felt it, something was going to happen, and now that it had happened. 

Even if he had known it was going to happen, he had not anticipated this kind of destruction. Blood. Death. Everywhere he looked. Screams, gurgling, crying. Minho felt nauseous. The bloody sword from his hand dropped, clattered against the deckboards as the rain thrummed around him. In normal situations the rain would have comforted him. Not today. Today it was laughing at him and his misery. 

Minho felt it before he could realize it. Fire. Not inside him, but underneath his feet, he turned around, he saw everyone but no one, no one important, no one that he would feel sorry for, 

and then his eyes fell on the figure next to the railing, who was clutching his ear, blood seeping from in between his fingers, Minho made a decision against all he had ever stood for in that split second, as he surged towards that figure, no one else mattered, he wouldn’t feel sorry for anyone else but him. He had only seconds, he knew that, he heard yelling, the waves, coughing, and then his hand found another hand, he had only seconds, he hauled the sobbing mess of a person up, “hold your breath”, he mumbled and threw the person over the railing into the waters below them, he had only seconds, “Abandon ship!”, and then he jumped from the railing into the feisty waves below his feet. 

The sea welcomed him with open arms as he dove into it, and above him the water turned into fire as the remaining barrels full of gunpowder in the hull of Euryale were set on fire and they exploded, destroying the entire ship with it. Minho dove further, he could see the deep blue around him turn into orange, the sea salt pricked in his eyes, as he swam forward, away from the havoc and immediate danger. Then his lungs started to burn, and he finally swam up, broke the water’s surface and gasped for air. Minho turned around, and the sight in front of him ingrained itself into his brain for the rest of his life; Euryale, nothing but splinters and smithereens, crackling pieces of wood. She sank, the waters pulled her slowly down to her watery grave, her final resting place. Her flag was torn, nothing but a memory now. 

“No! No!” Minho heard the scream, fading into cries, far away from him, traveling from the ship behind Euryale. He recognized that voice. It belonged to Felix. It finally snapped Minho awake, back to reality, in which he was swimming in the middle of the ocean, and he had a hopefully-alive person to find. He started swimming towards the sinking shipwreck, tried to listen to something, anything, until he heard spluttering and coughing from somewhere to his left. 

Minho swam towards the noise, and there he was, hanging on to a spare barrel, the blue around him had started to turn red, he had more injuries than just his ear, didn’t he?   
“Jisung.” Minho swam next to him, held on to the barrel with him. Jisung was still coughing, he kept his eyes shut. He seemed nearly unconscious, and Minho figured he was close to passing out. He brushed a few strands of wet hair away from his face. His lips were turning blue, he was pale. Minho had to act fast. He pressed two fingers against his pulse point at the juncture of his neck and closed his eyes for a moment. He could feel the energy pouring from him, through his fingers, into Jisung. That should keep him alive, at least for now. Minho turned around again, he could hear more coughing, but not from Jisung, so he didn’t care about that, and ah, there! Behind the waves, there was the little boat Minho had unattached from its roped in the midst of the battle, because he had known, he had felt it, Euryale was going to end up in flames on this very afternoon, as it had done, and quickly Minho swam towards the boat. It took him a while to reach it, the waves weren’t bad, but they were waves, and clearly did not want to let go of the living as they nearly had them in their hold already. 

Minho hauled himself into the boat with much difficulty, nearly toppled it over in the process, but finally steadied himself in it. Thank god, the oars were in the boat already, otherwise they would have been in trouble, more than they already were. Minho listened, he could hear coughing, but nothing more. A silence had fallen. And then the coughing stopped, too, and now Minho was in a much more hurry than before. He started rowing the boat towards Jisung, and reached him quickly, thank gods. Minho felt the panic taking over as he saw a slumped figure, head only a few inches above the waterline, clearly unconscious hanging on to the barrel.   
“Jisung.” He said, but got no answer.   
“Jisung!” Minho dropped himself into the water next to him. He had to get the boy on the boat. Unless, unless– no, he could still feel his pulse. He was alive. He was alive, and that kept Minho going. 

If it had been difficult for Minho to get himself on the boat, then pushing an unconscious boy on it was even more difficult, but soon he gathered some of that energy that was surging through his veins and pushed Jisung on the small boat. With the help of the barrel next to him Minho hauled himself up again, and dragged Jisung to a sitting position, before pressing his hand against his chest. His heart was still beating, good, he hadn’t inhaled any water, good, he was just disoriented, and suffered from blood loss. 

Minho tore his pocketknife out of his sash and cut a piece of fabric from the leg of his pants. Then he wrapped that around Jisung’s head for a makeshift gauze, that wouldn’t even probably help, but it was going to ease Minho’s mind just a bit- why was he even doing this? Minho, you stupid little witch, it’s never good to take any more responsibility except that of yourself, never trust anyone but yourself, and for the love of gods, don’t stay behind saving people! That’s what his mother had told him, years ago, before she had pushed him from the shoulder and forced him to leave his home village. And here he was, saving some fucking- some- saving some- no one. It made Minho mad at himself. He huffed and sat down, Jisung was stable for the moment, they could perhaps make it, Minho heard coughing but decided to pay no attention to it, the rest were on their own now. Selfish, but one needed to be selfish to survive. He looked at the sky, thick clouds covered it, and Minho had to close his eyes again and focus his energy and ah, there was the sun, it had shifted a bit to the west, and if that was on the west side, then they had to row south, so that’s what Minho started doing. 

Rowing. 

He knew land wasn’t that far, they had been sailing close to the coastline, that’s what Chan had said earlier, so the land had to be just behind the horizon. Minho turned the boat around, his backside was on the way they were going, and he was left staring at Jisung’s face and the remains of Euryale behind them. And soon he realized his situation – he was rowing a boat, in the middle of the sea, with a half-stranger, who was really no stranger, but rather someone could describe as a ‘friend’, who was bleeding profusely, with the rain pouring around them, towards the unknown. 

Oh, well. Minho had survived from worse odds. 

Then again, he had never had anyone else to look out for those times. 

It didn’t take that long for Minho to turn to look over his shoulder and see the greenery peeking through the grey of the afternoon. The rain had slowed down, it wasn’t pouring as hard as before. He may have whispered a few pretty words to the sea to ease his way through the waves, an after nearly an hour of rowing, their little boat bumped against the white sands of some island in the middle of the Caribbean. Jisung was still unconscious as Minho dragged the boat to the shore. He was exhausted, he could feel the energy in him lessening little by little all the time, yet he still pressed his fore- and index finger against the pulse point in Jisung’s neck and poured some more in him. Jisung was shivering, the wet cloth against his head was all red now, and Minho felt the coldness of anxiety creeping up his spine.

Quickly he turned around and ran over the white sands towards the jungle rising behind it. The nature always had so much to offer, that was the only thing Minho missed whenever he was on the seas, and the nature had so much to offer this time, too, as Minho recognized a few worts growing next to a fallen tree, exactly what he needed. He ran back to Jisung, whose eyes had slightly opened, but his gaze didn’t focus.   
“Are you awake?” Minho asked. He wasn’t expecting an answer, as he quickly untied the rag from around his head. He tore the worts to little pieces and pressed them against Jisung’s bleeding ear, focusing a bit of energy in them. Usually the energy wasn’t needed, but this time Minho felt like it was. 

“Mmhh… Min… Minho?” Jisung slurred, barely awake, surprisingly. He was still shivering. Minho realized Jisung still had his sash on, so he got to work to untie it.  
“O-oh? I didn’t know you were… that eager… I would ha-ve… got ready… you’re a hands-y one, huhm?” Really? At the brink of death, too? Minho hummed as he pulled the sash open, a little pouch and a knife and a water flask dropped on the floor of the boat. Minho tied the sash around Jisung’s head to keep the worts in their place for maximum impact. Jisung fell unconscious again.

And shivered. Minho felt the cold creeping up to him, too. He had to get them both dry. He stood up and looked around, but saw nothing. The jungle wasn’t empty, he could feel that, but he couldn’t just leave Jisung out here in the open bleeding as he himself would go search for… something. Or well, he could. But something had happened to Minho in the last five months, and suddenly he just… couldn’t leave Jisung behind. And he was running out of energy. 

So he got another idea, and ran towards the jungle again. Underneath the huge leaves were sticks and branches that were still dry, and with them Minho ran back to the shore. He hauled Jisung up and dragged him on the sand. He was constantly flickering in and out of consciousness, Minho had to be hasty, he had to get him warm. He turned the boat around and braced it with two similar-sized branches from the other side, creating a shelter for them from the rain. Then he pushed Jisung inside that, took off his own sash and placed it underneath his head, made sure he was in a comfortable position and still unconscious, and the energy was decreasing all the time, Minho could feel it, his fingers started to ache, stiffen and oh – oh, he was bleeding, too. From his leg. Oh well, look at that, Minho hadn’t even realized, he was so busy looking after Jisung, that’s why his energy was decreasing so quickly. 

He knew the energy wouldn’t last long enough, so the cut just had to stop bleeding on its own now. Minho gathered the smaller sticks and branches together and with the last remaining bits of his energy, he blew fire into those little branches. Blue fire. Hot, but not too hot, not so hot it would burn them. Just enough to keep them warm and dry them up. He glanced at Jisung one last time, he was still breathing, still alive, and that was all that really mattered. Haha, odd. Minho didn’t like the way he was feeling. Then he, too, finally let his guards fall down and the velvety darkness engulfed him. 

*** 

Minho knew things. That’s how it had always been, he knew things, he felt them in his gut, and more than often the things turned out to be true. It was somewhat of a curse, Minho would have rather lived without knowing when the end was near, or when the ship was going to sink, or when people didn’t like him. Or perhaps he wouldn’t call it necessarily knowing things, it was more of just… feeling. An itch, if you will. An itch, that he had learned to read, to know, to feel. But occasionally, that itch turned out to be a blessing, and so did this time. 

Minho had woken up from his sleepless haze before Jisung, as expected. It had taken him a moment to actually realize where he had been, on an unmarked island’s shore with nothing but his clothes with himself. He had ‘slept’ the entire night, and woke up along with the sun. The fire had mostly dried him, it had warmed him up, Minho hadn’t been shivering in the morning anymore, and neither had been Jisung. But he had been still weak, so Minho had passed some of his restored energy to him. And then he had got to work. 

Work had meant searching. For what? Anything. Anything useful. A tiny part of Minho’s brain had tried to remind him of what he had a day ago lost, but he had pushed it away and simply kept on looking. Kept on moving. That’s what he had done. And because he knew things, he felt them, he felt that the jungle had certain energy laced in it, in the roots of the trees and bushes, in the slithering snakes and screaming birds. Energy, that he knew by his heart, but still somehow different. The energy had been old, older than Minho. And it hadn’t been his. Still wasn’t.

And neither had been the old shack peeking through the huge leaves of the jungle, built next to a stream that occasionally widened and deepened to a small river. But Minho had stepped into that old shack and its floorboards had creaked and welcomed him home, and Minho had decided, that the shack in the jungle was better than a boat out in the open shore. 

So Minho had created them a… home. If one could call it that. Minho rarely felt like he was home, in fact, he hadn’t felt like he was home ever since he had had to abandon his family. But he had created them some sort of a home. He had kept Jisung asleep for two days now, his ear had thankfully stopped bleeding, but he had multiple injuries elsewhere, too, and Minho wasn’t ready to deal with a heartbroken Jisung just yet. He hadn’t even… he hadn’t even himself spared a thought to what had… happened… two days ago. And he would have rather kept it that way. 

The little cottage was all that – little, and messy, and cramped, but somewhat homely. It had been once someone’s, most likely another witch’s. Minho had found some old notebooks of theirs, containing some instructions for potions and so on. Nothing too extreme. Minho guessed the witch had been young, and they had moved elsewhere to learn more of their magic. That was one thing about witches – they couldn’t stay rooted in one place for long. 

Minho was sitting in the small kitchen of the cottage. It had some cupboards and a table and two unsteady stools, as well as an oven. Everything was wooden in color, nothing was painted, it was just a little, no longer abandoned cottage in the middle of the jungle. However, the cottage hadn’t been alone since the beginning, Minho could see outlines of old buildings next to the cottage, old ruins, that had withered away with the world. Perhaps the area had once been a small village, Minho didn’t know, he hadn’t had time to go look around that much yet. He had fixed the cottage’s leaking roof, and the front door, and a few holes on the floor, but otherwise the cottage was in a rather good condition. Just a bit messy. A bit musty and dusty, but thank goodness Minho had spent most of his life as a deckboy, and he knew how to clean. The cottage had thankfully provided him those, cleaning supplies, along with other supplies. Sheets for the bed. Some cutlery and dishes. Fishing tools. Hunting tools. A cupboard full of dried herbs and worts and everything Minho could ask for (even if he wasn’t a healer). Even some clothes that fit him, and now he was wearing a basic white shirt and brown breeches (very uncomfortable, he still preferred black). That’s why Minho figured that whoever had lived here before them, had left in a haste, and not that long ago. A year, maybe two at most. 

The cottage consisted of three rooms, the kitchen, the bedroom, and the sort of livingroom-hallway leading to the door outside. There were some old coats hanging from the coatrack next to the door. There were also shelves on that room, there were all sorts of books, a chest that Minho hadn’t still dared to open, and a soft armchair. Minho had slept in that armchair last night, as Jisung was sleeping on the bed. There was only one bed in the house, and even if it was quite a large bed, larger than usually, Minho still hadn’t dared to sleep next to Jisung. 

It would have been odd. And Jisung was hurt, Minho didn’t want to move him. Minho felt sort of trapped, why on earth had he taken Jisung with him? He could have saved anyone, or no one, and if he had been alone, he could have already been in San Juan on his way to the next ship and next life and next sea and his mother’s voice was ringing in his ears again, Minho, remember to stay put every once in a while, just breathe, linger, don’t move around all the time, so perhaps this was one of those lingering moments. It would be that, just a moment, Jisung would get better soon and then they would… leave? Go their separate ways? 

Or would they? Jisung had been nothing but kind to Minho in the past. He had been friendly to him on Euryale, the ship they both had been sailing with, even if Minho himself had constantly shrugged him off and pushed him away. Jisung had always taken Minho into account and kept him company and asked him how he was feeling, and Felix had told him that Jisung didn’t despise him, quite the opposite, in fact, he saw Minho as his friend. And Felix had been most likely right, he was a feeler, an empath, he understood how people worked. Minho really didn’t. And that was also the reason he had started to steer clear of them. 

And he didn’t want to think about Felix. He didn’t want to dwell in that feeling akin to sorrow at all. Perhaps he missed the governor’s son. Perhaps not. Felix had been one of the few people in Minho’s life that had seen him as more than just a witch. 

A grunt suddenly snapped Minho out of his thoughts, he surged up from the little stool and quickly, and quietly made his way to the bedroom. The bedroom was as undecorated as the other rooms, there was one bed, a shelf and a little nightstand next to the bed. Opposite wall to the bed was a window, Minho had drawn the old, dusty curtains shut to block the sunlight from Jisung’s eyes. Jisung was laying in bed, eyes still shut, but his face was contorted in pain. He grunted again, tried to move his arm a bit. 

“Are you awake?” Minho softly asked. He circled the bed to the other side, next to the nightstand. There was a bowl of clean water and a rag on it, with some dried worts in a glass jar next to it, and a glass of water.   
“Mmwhere-am-I?” Jisung grunted; “W-what is going on?” His voice was hoarse.   
“You are in a cottage in the middle of nowhere, and you are hurt.”   
“M-Minho?” Jisung finally opened his eyes. Or well, other eye, the other was covered by a gauze.  
“Yes”, Minho responded. He hadn’t- fuck. How the hell would he explain to him how they had ended up in the little isle in the first place? How would Minho tell Jisung that he had been the one to throw him over the railing and rescue him, leaving everyone else behind? 

Jisung tried to move, Minho quickly took ahold of his shoulders;  
“Let me help. Let’s get you to sit. You have a pretty nasty wound on your rib, so it might hurt. And on your leg. And your arm.” And your ear. Minho helped Jisung to a sitting position against the headboard of the bed and helped him drink some water from the glass. There was blood on the sheets, it had seeped through some of the bandages. Jisung lifted his arms, clearly in pain, and tried the bandage around his head.   
“W-what’s this…?”   
“You lost your ear in the battle. Do you remember the battle?” 

Jisung turned his questioning gaze to Minho, who had sat on the edge of the bed. Minho watched, as the realization struck him, fell on his features. He watched, as the tears brimmed his ears.   
“T-the battle…” Jisung whispered. Minho could hear it. The fear. The panic. The sorrow.   
“W-what happened- where are the others- why- what-?!” Jisung tried to stand up, but moaned in pain and fell back against the headboard as he moved too quickly. Minho didn’t know what to say. He really didn’t. He wasn’t used to… having… people around him… and having to tell… people things that might hurt them. That would hurt them. 

He swallowed. He couldn’t lie, he owed that to Jisung.   
“I’m sorry I… I don’t know about the rest. I didn’t see them.”   
“W-what do you mean ‘see’?”   
“What is the last thing you remember?”   
“I fell down in the water as someone pushed me in there.”   
“That someone was me. Because Euryale exploded a second after that.” 

Jisung fell silent. Then the tears that had brimmed in his ears finally broke free.   
“E-exploded?” he whimpered. It hurt Minho in a way he couldn’t really explain. He nodded.   
“A-and the rest are…?”   
“I don’t know. Some could have survived. Some could have died. Most of the people were dead already before the men of Victory set the gunpowder barrels on fire.”   
“And Felix is…?”   
“On Victory with his father. He’s taking him back to Nassau.”   
“A-and. Changbin?”   
“I don’t know.”   
“Chan?”   
“I don’t know.”   
“Seungmin?”   
“I don’t know.”   
“Hyunjin?”   
“I don’t know.”   
“J-Jeongin?”   
“I don’t know.” 

Jisung’s lower lip quivered. His gaze fell on the bed, the white sheets around him, his fists balled up. He shuddered. Minho felt a knot in the pits of his stomach.   
“I’m sorry”, he mumbled. Jisung shook his head. Minho wasn’t entirely sure what that meant.   
“I need to check your ear. Is that okay?” And now Jisung answered with a nod. Minho untied the gauze from around his head. There was dried blood on the wound that marked the place where Jisung’s ear had once been. Now there was just. Nothing.   
“Do you hear my voice?” Minho asked.   
“Yes.” Jisung whimpered.   
“Good. It means you didn’t lose your ability to hear, then.”   
“It just sounds a little muffled.” Jisung told Minho. He didn’t seem to be entirely present. Minho couldn’t really blame him, could he? He had been so close to everyone. They had been his friends. Were. They could still be alive (even if Minho really doubted it). Minho would never understand the feeling of loss Jisung was going through. 

Minho cleaned the wound, Jisung winced and tried to lean away from the pain, but Minho didn’t let him. He pressed more healing worts against his ear, poured a bit energy in them to relieve Jisung at least from one of his agonies before tying a clean cloth around his head. Then he checked the other wounds, too, they were in much better shape already, even if the one on Jisung’s ribs was a deep one. Otherwise he was most likely fine. Sad, grieving, hurt, but fine. He wasn’t dying. Which was good. Minho stood up from the bed, cleaned his hands on the rag from all of the blood.   
“Yell if you need anything. Try to get some sleep. It will heal your wounds faster.” 

Jisung didn’t answer. He simply kept on staring ahead of him, tears falling down his cheeks, as he nodded. 

*** 

Minho let Jisung be. He didn’t really know what else to do, it wasn’t like he spent time… comforting others on daily basis. He just let him be, occasionally he went to check up on him and change the bandages and give him food, but otherwise he just let him be. He got to know the surroundings of the house, the water in the creek was clean and drinkable, there was a tiny family of mice living underneath their porch. Minho hoped they would stay that way, as a tiny family. 

Minho also let Jisung be, because he didn’t entirely know where he stood with him. He knew Jisung considered him as a friend. A very dear friend. He had said it multiple times to him, “Oh, Minho, you’re so funny to be around! Oh, Minho, do you want to have lunch with me today? Minho, I can do this and that with you and so on”, that’s what friends did, right? That’s how Felix had acted with him, too, only he had been quieter and a bit… less eccentric. Still was, he wasn’t dead. Unless his father’s ship had sunk, which was highly unlikely. The thought of Felix ached Minho’s heart, and he still didn’t like that feeling, but perhaps it was normal, since he had considered Felix as his friend, and now he was gone, and they would probably never meet again. In other words, Minho was missing him. And he was sad that he had lost him. 

Minho had been taught to be self-sufficient, and to him, that had meant shutting himself off from other people. His mother had taught him that, and the world had taught him the rest. That’s why it was so hard for him to… open up and trust people and call them his friends. That’s why he still didn’t know, if he really considered Jisung as his friend. Sure, they were more than strangers, Jisung knew things about Minho, but not that much. In turn, Minho knew a lot about Jisung, because he just didn’t know when to shut up. And that was as endearing as it was occasionally annoying, especially on those moments that Minho craved silence. His magic craved silence. 

And yes, Minho knew that shutting himself away from other people was not the best thing to do, but it hadn’t been just him who had forced the walls around him up, the world had done its fair share of that, too. A little too many people knew about his magical abilities, and a little too many of those people had wanted to get use out of them. So Minho had had to survive on his own, and when he had a few times done that mistake of trusting people, he had found himself in situations that he did not like, and he had realized, that those who he had trusted, just wanted to use him. In more ways than one. So now Minho just… shut everyone off. Even if their intentions weren’t ill. Felix’s hadn’t been. And he had said that Jisung’s weren’t either. 

And the mistakes he had made were also the reason why he was constantly wary nowadays. Always on the edge. Always ready to flee, to fight his way out. He was always aware of his surroundings, he sat in pubs with his back to the wall and his eyes towards the door. He heard everything. He smelled everything. He felt everything. And right now, sitting on that armchair in the sort-of living room, in candlelight (he had found a stack of those in one of the cupboards), he felt that Jisung was sad. Of course he was sad, he had lost his friends, his family, his whole entire life. The entire crew of Euryale, that mighty ship that had sailed across the world for many years now. 

Minho knew that he should have most likely felt a bit sadder, too. Euryale had been good to him, there had been a few people that had got a tad too close, but after Minho had lost his cool one too many times, the rest had let him be. The captain had been… okay. Not the worst, but not the best, and he had nearly hauled Minho over the edge because he hadn’t been able to use the crystal ball every time he tried. It just wasn’t his thing, that was all there was to it. All witches had their own thing, some were better at healing, some were better at potions, some were better at fortune telling and operating the crystal ball. Minho was better at directing energy, which was a very vague thing to say, but his magical abilities hadn’t really bloomed yet. 

All in all, Euryale had been fairly good to him. Felix had been more than good to him, Minho felt a certain type of fondness over him. He hoped the boy would somehow survive from the hell that he was being dragged back into. He deserved better than that. Minho also knew that the reason that he wasn’t feeling any sadder was because he didn’t let himself be. He didn’t allow that. Sadness and mourning and grieving meant that he would lose focus and succumb into himself and he couldn’t allow that. They still weren’t in clear waters, there was something lurking in the jungle, a presence, not a hateful one, but it was there, so Minho couldn’t lose focus, he had to be aware and careful to not anger any entities. Or real people. 

Minho didn’t mourn because he didn’t let himself to do that, but the person a few meters to his right certainly did, and now Minho couldn’t sleep because of the crying (and because of how uncomfortable the armchair was). He shifted, shifted again, but the sleep just didn’t come. Because part of him felt… anxious. He didn’t like that, the sound of crying. He didn’t like hearing (or seeing) Jisung sad. 

They were friends, right? At least according to Jisung. Friends were supposed to be there for each other and comfort each other. And perhaps, if they were going to be spending a lot of time together in an abandoned cottage in the middle of the Caribbean, they could be friends. Minho would… be friends with Jisung. Consider himself as one. So he had to act like a friend. And that’s why he stood up, pondered for a moment, before his hesitant steps lead him through the door to the little bedroom. 

The moonlight seeped through the curtains, it illuminated the room in silvery light, drew long shadows against the walls. Jisung had pulled his knees to his chest, and he was sobbing in his hands, his blood-stained blanket was tangled around his legs. He hadn’t heard Minho approaching. Minho cleared his throat, and Jisung’s head snapped up.   
“O- oh I’m s-sorry, I’m keeping you awake, aren’t I?” He hiccuped. Minho shook his head, but Jisung just continued rambling, as he always did; “I’m really sorry, I really am, I just, I don’t, I don’t know, I-“  
“Jisung, it’s okay.” Minho mumbled. He sat on the edge of the bed, momentarily unsure of his actions. 

“Can I hug you?” he then asked. Surprise flashed in Jisung’s eyes, and then he nodded, Minho saw the hesitation in the gesture. He was clearly questioning, whether Minho was serious. But he was. So he leaned forwards, and pulled Jisung into a hug that was as tight as the wounds on him let it be. Minho felt Jisung answer to the hug, as he pressed his face against Minho’s shoulder and wrapped his arms around him. 

Jisung trembled.   
“I just. Are they gone? Are they really gone?” he whimpered. Minho didn’t know what to say, because he didn’t know the answer. Maybe they were gone. Maybe they had got lucky. So instead of answering, he simply tightened his hold just a bit more. 

And that broke the dam down.   
“Am I ever going to see them again? Are they gone? Are they dead? They can’t be I- I- I never got to say anything to Changbin”, Jisung sobbed against Minho’s shoulder. They had fought, Changbin and Jisung, Minho could remember it clear as a day. That had been the reason why Jisung had started to hang out with Minho so much.   
“And I, I never got to apologize to Felix, and I, never told Chan how much I appreciate him and, and, and I never told Jeongin how bright he is or how Hyunjin is so much more than his siren charms and Seungmin is the best cook we have ever had and I- I can’t I-“   
Minho rubbed Jisung’s back up and down. He hoped that was enough. He felt the fabric on his shoulder dampening.   
“They can’t be gone, right? They can’t. They’re immortal. We were all supposed to be. Untouchable. Changbin promised me we would die in a battle together when we were kids, he promised, and now he’s… gone? Just like that?”   
“He might be. Or he might be not. He could have survived, too”, Minho’s voice was steady, smooth. He knew that he shouldn’t give Jisung any hope in case it would turn out to be false, that just wasn’t fair, but here he was. Trying to ease the pain he himself didn’t completely understand. 

Jisung fell silent, just kept on crying against Minho’s shoulder, and Minho let the boy do that. He needed it. They just stayed silent in the dim room, Minho poured a tiny amount of his energy into the hug, just to make it a little easier to breathe for Jisung, who shuddered with every sob.   
“What are we going to do?” The boy finally whimpered, still against Minho’s shoulder.   
“I think right now would be best for us to stay here for a while. At least until you’re healed. Then we’ll just… I don’t know. Live. Find our path”, Minho mumbled.  
“We?” 

“…Yeah. We.” 

***

The healing begun, slowly, but surely. After two days Jisung finally got out of bed without Minho’s help, he could finally stand and walk on his own, the pain on his leg and ribs wasn’t so strong anymore. His ear had started healing, too. He could still hear with that ear, so there was luckily nothing wrong with his hearing, but he had explained that everything sounded a little more hollow, and he couldn’t, for example, differentiate Minho’s speaking voice from the waves at the shoreline (they had taken a little stroll one day), unless Minho spoke louder than usually. It was harder from him to differentiate from where around him all the sounds came from, too. He would get used to it, Minho knew it, but it would most likely affect his swording abilities quite a bit. 

Days bled into weeks. Jisung found out that Minho had slept in the armchair, and insisted that they would switch every other day, so Minho wouldn’t have to sleep so uncomfortably every night. Minho had tried to say it was fine, but Jisung didn’t give in, of course he didn’t. And he was fully healed now, he could sleep in the armchair just fine! So he did. 

With Jisung’s physical healing, he began to roam around the house more, too, and Minho could finally go explore the woods around them more in-depth. He didn’t take Jisung with him, as he was still rather slow, and the presence in the jungle shyed away from him. Minho had been correct, their cottage was a part of a bigger cluster of ruins, there had once been a small village in the area, but nature had overtaken it, as it was bound to do. Otherwise their current living area was peaceful, it gave them nearly everything they needed, and Minho cared for it in turn. 

For the first weeks Jisung was still a bit sniffly, Minho could hear him crying during the nights, on some he even went to comfort the boy as it seemed to ease his sorrow a bit. One day they had found a few pieces of wood that had drifted to the shore, and they both knew immediately they originated from Euryale. Jisung had broken to a cry on the white sands, clutching that piece of wood in his hands. Minho had felt sorry for him, but again, all he had known to do was just… hug him. 

Minho also got used to Jisung’s constant presence. He noticed that whenever Jisung was alone (or thought that he was alone, as Minho moved pretty quietly), he was quiet. Kept to himself, and not because of the sorrow, but once he’d see Minho or feel his presence, he would put on his best smile and start talking. That somehow bugged Minho, and he didn’t really know why. It wasn’t annoying, in fact, Minho had started to like Jisung’s explosive persona and his constant speech as it distracted him from his own thoughts and doubts, and also then he himself didn’t need to fill in the silence (which still was a bit awkward at times). 

But even if he had got used to Jisung’s presence, he was still careful. Wary. He still hadn’t entirely grasped the situation, that they both were stranded on an island in a cottage in the middle of nowhere, together, and had nothing but each other’s company, and that everyone they had considered as friends were most likely dead. It was just… surreal. So Minho decided not to think about that, and just kept on going. He went out to hunt for food every day, brought back birds or fish or other meat, collected fruits and berries and leaves from the jungle and tried to keep the cottage in a somewhat okay condition. Jisung helped, of course, he mostly cleaned the place and chopped firewood for them. He wanted to go hunting, too, but Minho didn’t take him with him, because he still tried to get to know the presence in the woods. It wasn’t a spirit, nor a ghost, that’s what Minho had learned. 

Until one day Jisung had left before him, a bucket and a fishing rod and a net with him to the shore, and Minho hadn’t been able to say anything, and that’s how Minho learned that Jisung was quite self-sufficient and adaptative, and he didn’t need Minho constantly worrying after him anymore. Then they started taking turns, every other day Minho would go hunting, every other day he would stay in and look after the house. Read books. Try to get to know the thing in the jungle. Practice magic. 

Yeah. He still hadn’t told Jisung. He knew that he should, but he didn’t know how to. Or when. He didn’t dare to tell Jisung, what if he would freak out? He wouldn’t, he was familiar with magic, he had two medallions around his neck that he had bought from a witch in Tortuga, he didn’t fear magic. But somehow, Minho still didn’t dare to do it. 

But that’s how they lived, and soon weeks bled into a month, two months. Every now and then Minho found Jisung from the shore at the evenings, gazing at the sea, longing. He knew it was his blood calling him back to the seas. And if Jisung had told him he would leave back to the seas next morning, Minho would have let him do it. But he never did, he came back every time, filled in the silence in the cottage, and occasionally, Minho felt warm. 

*** 

“I think we should go visit the nearby town some time”, Jisung blurted out one day, when they were eating dinner. Minho cocked his eyebrow at the boy, he wasn’t entirely sure how close the town was, but he knew there was one.   
“I’ve just seen plenty of ships sailing quite close to the shore, and all of them disappear behind the cape, so I think the town might be there. We could use some new clothes. And spices, maybe.”   
“With what money?”  
A smile widened on Jisung’s features (didn’t keep the sadness away from his eyes, though): “I’m glad you asked! Today, when you were out, I opened the chest that has been sitting next to the armchair unopened for ages! And guess what I found!” He rose up from his seat and quickly scuttled to the living room, before returning with a pouch made of red velvet. He dropped it on the table with a clink. Minho took it and opened it, inside was quite a bit of gold coins. 

“Was there anything else in the chest?” Minho had completely forgotten about that. He knew he should have most likely looked into it, since the cottage had been a witch’s before them, and it probably contained something important, since it was locked.   
“A notebook and a few books and a few funny looking jars. Nothing out of ordinary, or like, this place is weird anyway, so, I think it may have been a witch’s or something, but then abandoned for some reason, and I don’t want to think about that reason.” Sometimes Jisung was so smart but sometimes so stupid.   
“You think so?”   
“Yeah. There are… odd books. And I don’t know, this place just has that feel…”   
There was also a huge odd-looking circle in the roof of the bedroom that had broken and was painted with blood, and most likely used to summon some entities, but that apparently was not odd according to Jisung, since he didn’t mention it.  
“Mmhm”, Minho hummed as an answer (as he did most of the time to Jisung). 

“Anyway. I think we should go. Or I’ll go, if you don’t want to come. Except I don’t want to go without you. So it would be better for both of us to go. To see. The world. Since this is just jungle.” It wasn’t just jungle, but Minho wouldn’t tell that to Jisung. He didn’t need to know, at least not yet.   
“Okay. Okay, we’ll go.” 

*** 

So they went. It took them half a day to reach the city close by. It wasn’t that large, roughly the size of Tortuga, but far more… clean and organized. The houses were built in clean lines, one big street lead from the market to the pier at the front of the city. Jisung had stared longingly at the ships tied to the pierposts. Minho hadn’t. The city hosted perhaps a few thousand inhabitants. It was lively, and lovely, and Minho didn’t feel like he fit in. The two of them got a lot of curious glances. He didn’t feel any magic, the city was… normal, for the most part. 

They walked around the city for a good while, Jisung pulled him from little boutique to another, soon they found themselves in the middle of the marketplace, buying fruits and vegetables and some seeds, Minho wanted to try growing his own little vegetable garden. There was music emanating from one corner, talking everywhere, it was a little overwhelming, but Minho kept his eyes on Jisung and followed him everywhere he went. Minho didn’t want to think about what would happen, if he were to lose him from his sight. 

Jisung was glowing. He had missed this. For the first time in the two months that they had spent on that little cottage, simply healing, he saw no pain in his eyes. Just… freedom. Excitement. He was content. And it made Minho content, too.   
“Minho? Did you hear what I said?”   
Minho snapped out of his thoughts, visibly returned back to the present. He noticed that a small smile was tugging the corners of his mouth. What was that for?   
“Sorry, what?”   
“I was wondering if we could go eat in a proper tavern?” Jisung sounded hopeful. His eyes shone. Minho looked up at the sky, pondered for a moment.   
“Okay. Let’s just not spend the whole evening there, otherwise we’ll have to walk through the jungle in the dark.” Well, some of it. Most of the travel was just along the shoreline. But Minho didn’t want to do it in the dark, since he didn’t want to admit that he was absolutely the worst at navigating in any sort of environment, especially in the dark. And he was a witch! He was supposed to be good at it or read the stars or leave little imprints but no, he was just the worst at it. If it wasn’t for the compass that was always hanging from his sash, he wouldn’t have known which way was north.   
“Yes!” Jisung nearly shrieked as he grabbed Minho from his arm again and dragged him in through the next tavern door he saw.

The tavern was just lively and lovely as the city and filled with warmth. A young man led them to a corner table, Minho sat his back against the wall, eyes on the door. He put down the basket he had brought with him next to his feet, it was now filled with new clothes and the vegetables he had brought from the market. They still had plenty of money left, so that was not a problem, though, Minho had no idea what they would do after they’d eventually run out of it. Jisung ordered them whatever the tavern was offering, and soon there was a table full of food in front of them. 

Both of them dug in, in a shared silence (surprisingly). The tavern was rather quiet, as it wasn’t late yet, perhaps five or six, Minho hadn’t been sure of the time in ages. Not that it really mattered, he rose when the sun did and went to sleep with it, too. People came and went, two men sat in a table close to them, and soon Jisung was blabbering away again, and there definitely was something to it, the silence had been peaceful, and Jisung didn’t strike to him as the type to hate silence, so what was it about? 

Soon they finished their meals, Minho paid for the whole thing from the pouch he was carrying in his sash. He took the basket, and together with Jisung they exited from the tavern to the marketplace, that had quieted down quite a bit. The sun was slowly setting, it would be night before they would reach the cottage. In the future they would have to leave earlier, and perhaps spend a little less time in the town, now that they knew where everything roughly was. 

They walked along a little lonely road, that lead to the bigger farms at the outskirts of the city. Then they would walk along the shoreline, before they would have to walk for a while in the jungle as the shoreline changed to huge rocks and steep cliffs in the cape, and then they would return back to walk the rest of the way on the shoreline again. Easy. Somewhat long of a way, but not too bad. Nothing impossible for them. The setting sun painted the sky slowly to orange, a man with his horse rode by them, he was on his way to the city. It was peaceful, the nature around them was quieting down, Jisung and Minho walked along the shoreline as the first stars lit up in the night sky. Thank gods Minho knew Jisung was good at navigating and would find their way home, since he had recently taken up a hobby of mapping the stars around them. 

They moved from the shore to the jungle, where it was much darker. Minho could feel it, the nature around him was alive, it was inviting, friendly. And then he felt the presence, it was close, closer than before. He tried searching for it but got nothing. Something ran from next to his leg. Jisung flinched from the bird screeches close by. 

And then suddenly, it wasn’t peaceful anymore. Minho heard a branch cracking from behind him, it broke the spell he had been under, and he quickly turned around. Steel flashed in the moonlight, and the next thing Minho realized was that there was a sword pointed right at his throat. Jisung gasped from next to him and grabbed his arm. Instinctively Minho brought his hand to his side, and then he realized that he hadn’t carried a sword ever since that night on Euryale.   
“If you would be so kind and give us all of your money and your belongings.” It was a man’s voice. Minho didn’t like it. How on earth hadn’t he felt the men’s, since there clearly two hooded figures in front of him, presences? How had he let himself to drop his guard like that (Minho knew the reason, but he wasn’t ready to examine it now or in the near future)?   
“And perhaps lead us to wherever you’re going”, the other man added.   
“So we don’t have to do anything drastic”, the first man stuck his sword a bit forwards. 

It was the two men from the tavern. They were thieves. Ironic. And Minho and Jisung were supposed to be pirates.   
“M-Minho, I- I think it would perhaps be best to just give them what they want.” Jisung mumbled next to his ear. Minho knew that if Jisung had had his sword, the situation would have turned out quite a bit different and the two thieves would be food for the fungi already.   
“Your pal is clever. Hand your stuff over.” 

“No”, Minho mumbled. He was mildly annoyed. These guys were just destroying his peaceful little evening stroll with Jisung, and now they had the audacity to try to steal his stuff? He needed the stuff. He wanted to grow his own plants. And he wanted to wear his new black clothes that suited him much better than the white and brown ones. And perhaps, he wanted to protect Jisung.  
“What did you say?” The man pointing a sword stepped forwards. Jisung pulled Minho by his arm.   
“I said no.”   
“Not a very wise move, unless you have some tricks in your sleeve”, the man snickered. 

Would it finally be the time for Jisung to know?   
“I do”, and as the words left Minho’s mouth, he focused a blast of energy in between his thumb and index finger on his right arm, and threw a ball of blue flames at the two men, just as something flew over his head, loudly screeching. Jisung got scared by the sound, and the ball of fire, and he gripped Minho’s left arm even harder. Minho quickly raised his right arm, focused his gaze on one of the huge branches above them, mumbled an apology to the nature around them, before he ripped that branch out of the tree and dropped it on the men, just as that odd screeching thing flied rapidly around their heads. Minho stepped back one, two, three steps, as he tried to understand what the thing was. 

“What the hell?” Jisung muttered under his breath. Then Minho heard loud cursing, the other man whacked something, he clearly hadn’t been too fazed by the huge branch that had fell on his back.   
“Run”, Minho turned to Jisung, grabbed the boy by his arm and started to run. 

They ran past the shadows of the jungle, Minho let his instincts take over as they avoided any trees and rocks and stumps and bushes as they ran past them in the darkness, they ran over a little creek, water splashed around them, Minho heard nothing but the jungle and his heartbeat, soon his lungs started to burn, and then, as the woods around him got deeper, he finally slowed down. They were far enough already. The thief wouldn’t chase after them, not in the jungle, they had the nature on their side, Minho knew it. Jisung was gasping for air next to him, Minho still hadn’t let go of him, but neither had Jisung let go of Minho.   
“What the hell. Was that? Where are we”   
“Shush”, Minho shushed Jisung down. He heard it. He felt it. 

The presence. That thing, the thing that had shot out of the jungle into the man’s faces just as Minho had thrown that ball of ghost fire, yes, that’s what it was called, at them. The presence was there. In the shadows. It had followed after them.  
“What-“  
“Shh!” 

Minho heard wings flapping. That presence was close to them. The presence that Minho had looked forward to meeting for the past two months, it was finally here, close to him. Minho reached forwards with his arm.   
“Hello?” he called out in the darkness.   
“Minho, what are you-“  
Minho squeezed Jisung’s hand in his. Just shut up for this moment.   
“You don’t need to be afraid, we won’t hurt you. Thank you for helping us with the thieves.”   
The presence came closer. It was in the trees. Soon it stepped into the moonlight. It stared at Minho, head a little tilted. Minho felt his breath get stuck in his throat. 

Minho had heard of familiars, some sort of spiritual guidances that witches sometimes had. His mother had had a turtle. He knew that familiars were something that chose the witch they wanted to guide and help, and the witch would know that by the connection they would feel while coming across that animal. He hadn’t really believed he would be the one to get one of those, as they weren’t that common. Apparently, he had been wrong. 

Soon the bird took flight, and after a few seconds, it landed on Minho’s arm. Jisung gasped out loud.   
“Hello”, Minho smiled softly at the bird. The owl. It was a little owl, that’s how much Minho could see in the darkness. It was dark and white in color, and had little spots all over its plumage. It was tiny, perhaps the size of Minho’s hand in height. He felt a connection. The owl stared at Minho for a moment, before it took flight again, and escaped to the nearby tree. No, not it. She.   
“What the hell is going on?” Jisung sounded overwhelmed. Minho squeezed his hand in his, took a better hold of the basket in his hand. 

“She’ll lead us home.” 

*** 

“You’re a witch.”   
“I am.”   
A silence. But only for a moment. 

“Hold on. You’re a witch?”   
“Yes, Jisung, I am.”   
“For how long?”   
“…For forever?”   
“You were a witch on Euryale, too?”   
“Yes?”   
“You have been a witch and watched me buy some stupid ass charm medallions from Tortuga and you haven’t even said a word?!”   
“They haven’t been stupid, they have been very real, and still are.”   
“You’re a witch?! A real witch?!” 

Minho sighed and leaned against the kitchen table. Jisung had been so shook and exhausted from the trip to the town that he had immediately fallen asleep, and Minho hadn’t had time to explain anything to him, so now here he was, in the kitchen the morning after. Jisung couldn’t believe his ears.  
“Yes, otherwise I wouldn’t have thrown that ball of ghost fire at the men that were trying to rob us last night.”   
“G-ghost fire?!” 

Minho sighed, rubbed the bridge of his nose before snapping his fingers to set that energy aflame. The little blue flame danced around his fingers. Jisung stared at his hand mouth agape.   
“You’re a witch!” He finally shrieked. It was finally registering into his brain. “That makes so much sense!”   
Minho rolled his eyes, it had certainly taken quite a while for Jisung to understand that. Oh well, at least now he did. And he didn’t seem to… hate it. Quite the opposite, to Minho’s relief.

“So what the hell was that bird thing last night?”   
“That? Oh, I don’t… I don’t really know how to explain it. But you’re going to have to get used to her presence. She’s going to stick with us from now on.” 

*** 

Time had a tendency to heal wounds, and this time was no different. Minho found it easier to think about Felix and the rest of the boys as the weeks passed. Perhaps he indeed had created a bond to them, and he had felt the loss of them deeper than he had anticipated. After all, they had all been very good to him, even if Jeongin had been very wary of him at first, though that had been quite expected, as he was wary of all things he didn’t understand. Had been wary. He was most likely part of the wind and waves now, as they said. 

Viola had created herself a little nest on top of one of the cupboards in the kitchen. That was the owl’s name, Viola, Minho didn’t know how the name had come to him, but it just had, and after that he had started to call the owl Viola. She responded to the call by hooting softly and flying to sit on Minho’s shoulder. She was a lovely little owl, and very protective of Minho (and Jisung, most likely because Minho was protective of Jisung). 

Yes, he had realized that. Every time they went to visit the little town, Minho kept gazing over his shoulder, he was wary of his surroundings, even more than before. He didn’t let Jisung walk into boutiques first, and he always stood on his left side nowadays, because that was the side the damaged ear was on. He was protective over Jisung, because they were friends, and Minho wanted to protect his friends. Now that he had at least one proper friend. 

Jisung had taken the witch thing pretty well. He hadn’t shown any signs (at least yet) of trying to use Minho’s powers for his own good, which was relieving. He had been pretty curious of them, and still was, of how magic worked, and Minho had done his best on trying to explain that. Unfortunately he himself still wasn’t completely at the height of his powers and didn’t really know how they worked, so he kept on exploring, and not alone, but with Jisung. Or well, Jisung watched in amazement as Minho continued on working his magic, ever so often muttering under his breath of how cool Minho was and how amazing he looked. Minho thought the last bit was a bit odd, but each to their own, he guessed. 

Minho had taught Jisung how to read after he had one evening briefly mentioned that he had wanted to do so. He had also continued mapping the stars, learning more about them, and the world, as he learned to read the books in their cottage. Minho bought a few more books with the money they had got from selling the vegetables they had grown in their little garden. There had been perhaps some magic involved, as Minho had managed to get all of their plants in their prime in under a week, and he continued to do so. He also liked gardening, a lot, so it brought him quite a bit of joy as he saw all the little plants growing and turning from little green sprouts to full blown carrots and turnips and all that. 

And that’s how they lived their life, in silence, just accompanying each other. Minho wasn’t entirely sure if they had grown closer, sure there was some sort of trust-based bond between them now, but otherwise they were just… living in the moment. Sort of caring for each other. Jisung liked fishing, he spent a lot of time at the creek or at the shore, while Minho felt hunting and exploring the nearby woods with Viola. 

Or perhaps silence was an overstatement, as Jisung still occasionally didn’t know how to shut up. It wasn’t irritating, but Minho still had a feeling that there was something behind it. And the sadness was still evident in Jisung’s eyes. Of course it was. He had lost his family. Minho still felt sorry for him. But he wasn’t as sad before, oh no, the sadness just seemed to engulf him from time to time, and on those times he became cloudy-eyed, stared into nothingness, or he wept against his pillow and shuddered with the sobs. On those times, Minho went to hug him. 

The night was falling around Minho. He had just finished a book about potions, the one that Jisung had found from the chest, and left it laying on his lap as he sat on the armchair and listened to the silence around him. Viola was sleeping in her nest, Minho could feel her soft, passive presence in the kitchen. It was odd, the bond Minho and the owl had, they somehow understood each other perfectly well, right from the start, even if it had taken a little while for Viola to show herself. That’s how familiars were, a bit peculiar, a bit odd in a way that Minho couldn’t really explain. Animals, with conscience and consciousness. A guide from the spirit world. 

Minho listened to the silence and realized that it was too quiet. He put out the candles on the chest next to him, and placed the book next to them, before rising up. Jisung wasn’t… home. He was somewhere else. Usually he returned from his little trips around the island before sunset, but now the sun had already set, and the dark was creeping from the shadows. A stir of fear ignited in Minho’s guts. Where was he? Where was Jisung? 

Minho walked out of the cottage, closed the door after him. The little garden was covered by shadows of the trees. Minho could hear waves of the sea, that’s how close their little house was to the shore. And that’s where he decided to go, to the shore, where the earth met the sea. Because Jisung loved the sea. 

And that’s where Minho found him, sitting on the huge rocks that were just at the waterline, watching the sunset. Minho climbed on top of the rocks and sat next to Jisung after a moment of hesitation.   
“Hey”, Minho mumbled. The sky above them was painted violet, still pink in the horizon, where the sun was receding below the sea.   
“Hey”, Jisung muttered. He had brought his knees close to his chest, he was sad. Minho felt it. Of course he did, he always did. 

“Did you find anything interesting on your walk?” Minho asked.   
“Not really. Same shores, same waves”, Jisung answered, unusually shortly for him.   
“But the waves are never the same.”   
“Never? I think I have watched the same waves for the past months now. They just never change. They don’t bring me anything new.”   
“That simply means that you yourself are stuck.”   
“Mmhm”, Jisung hummed. It wasn’t a good hum, not a thoughtful one, it was a sad one. 

“What’s up?” Minho asked. Tonight was unusual in more than one way, it seemed, as he rarely was the one to initiate conversations.   
“Nothing much, I’m just… I don’t know. I don’t even know.”   
Minho nodded at the short answer. He glanced at Jisung for a second. The moonlight accentuated the scar slitting through Jisung’s features, all the way from his right browbone to his chin. His upper lip was split, too. He was lucky he still had his other eye, as the scar had once been a deep wound. It would never fade properly, but the edges weren’t as sharp anymore, as they had once been. A battle scar, Jisung had once told him, and Minho hadn’t asked any further. If Minho was completely honest, Jisung looked charming. Not just because of the scar, but because of… well, him. He looked charming. He was charming. And his doe-like eyes were filled with sorrow. Again. Minho turned his gaze to the horizon. 

The horizon was beautiful and restful, as it very often was. Minho could see the outlines of a ship far away from them, as it most likely made its way towards the docks of San Juan, which was at least a day’s travel away from them. Jisung sighed.   
“Do you think the sea has forgotten us?” he asked. Minho looked at him with a cocked eyebrow. He didn’t understand the question.   
“Has she forlorn us? Abandoned us? I feel like she has. I can no longer remember what the sea felt like under my feet, or how it felt to climb up the nest, or, or, or, what the waves felt like. I can no longer feel the pull inside of me towards the sea. It’s like I have forgot it. It’s like she’s… like we have… been forgotten. Like I have been forgotten.” 

Jisung had been confined on the shore for too long, Minho understood it now. He swallowed, fiddled with the hem of his shirt.   
“I can’t feel it either. The pull”, Minho confessed, more to ease Jisung than to actually tell the truth. He didn’t feel the pull, but it wasn’t because the sea wasn’t calling to him, he did miss the waves underneath his feet, too, but he just had other things to do, that kept pulling him back. He couldn’t leave this place; it hadn’t offered him it’s all just yet. 

But he couldn’t keep Jisung around much longer, if he didn’t want to stay. He was free to go, if he so wished, if he wanted to go find that pull back to the seas. Minho wanted to say it, out loud, but the words just got stuck in his throat. It was odd, it had never happened before. However, he knew the reason for it, of course he knew, he knew it all too well. 

He didn’t want to let Jisung go. He didn’t want for him to leave to explore the world on his own. He wanted to be able to protect him, and he wouldn’t be able to do that, if they were apart. He simply didn’t want Jisung to go. 

Minho didn’t want to be alone. 

In Minho’s silence, Jisung had again started to fill it. Which was… ‘normal’. Except that it wasn’t, and it had never been.   
“I, I, just, I don’t know, like, I want to go back to the seas but at the same time I don’t because all the others won’t be there and that’s sad and I don’t think I’ll find the same joy in it because it just like… like I always liked sailing and probably still do but, but, there won’t be the others there and the others are the ones that made it all worth it, you know? Like I don’t think killing people is fun or stealing stuff is fun except in some cases and living on the edge is also sort of exhausting but the people, they just, make it all worth it, and now the people are gone, and I don’t know I just, I’m scared and stuck and I’m blabbering again, I’m sorry I’m blabbering, I just, I do it because I think people will like me better when I’m nice and funny and talk a lot and smile a lot and I want people to like me because people don’t like quiet people or sad people and and I am quiet and sad people but I can’t show that and I’m just afraid that you will start to hatemetooforthatand-“  
“Jisung, I like you.” 

That finally shut him up. He turned to stare at Minho, eyes blown wide.   
“You don’t have to talk all the time, I’ll still like you. I like silence, I am fine with silence, and I can assure you, that so are a lot of people. Some people may prefer talkative and happy people, but believe me, most prefer people who are simply themselves. I am fine with your company, even in your silence. Even in your sadness. Because it is who you are, and you are my friend, and I like you who you are.” 

Something seemed to shift, Jisung’s expression fell, just a little. Minho was quite sure that it had something to do with the sadness.   
“Oh, I… just. Okay.”   
Minho felt the wings beating the air before he heard them, and after a few seconds, a soft ball of feathers settled on his shoulder. Jisung’s eyes flickered on Viola, before he turned to look at the horizon again.   
“You are nice and funny, you don’t need to worry about that in my presence. You can be sad and quiet, that’s okay, too”, Minho stammered, just a bit before pronouncing the next words: “I’ll be here for you. In your sadness. And your happiness.” 

Jisung nodded.   
“T-thank you”, he mumbled. Viola hooted softly.   
“She’ll be here for you, too”, Minho added. He felt the owl tugging the strands of his hair with her beak. Jisung chuckled, before he turned his gaze back to Minho. 

“You know, I really appreciate you. Thank you for… saving me and… standing me and… I don’t know. Everything, I guess.”   
Minho nodded, a gentle smile tugged the corner of his mouth.   
“You’re welcome.” 

After a brief silence, he added:   
“Thank you for staying with me.”   



	2. Year two: Leaving

The days bled into months, and soon the months bled into a year. They had spent a year in that little cottage, simply living their life, learning and healing. The sadness was no longer as overwhelming as it had been, Minho could see it from Jisung’s eyes. He was more comfortable now, too, he had finally started to believe that Minho wouldn’t hate him even if he was acting true to himself. In fact, that had somehow… brought them closer to each other. Minho trusted Jisung now, and Jisung trusted Minho. Jisung didn’t need to fill in the silence, they could both just stay quiet, and Minho didn’t judge Jisung’s sadness, but stood right next to him. It was perhaps new for the both of them, as Jisung wasn’t used to someone understanding him so deeply, and Minho wasn’t used to letting someone into his space. But somehow they managed, somehow they grew closer to each other, and started understanding each other better.

  
Viola liked Jisung, very much. Jisung was good with animals, that’s what Minho had noticed, he knew exactly how to gain their trust, and all the birds living close to their cottage were so used to him by now, that they ate seeds right from his palm. Viola often, when she was not sitting on Minho’s shoulder, was sitting on Jisung’s shoulder on his left side whenever Minho wasn’t standing there. Minho knew what it was all about, but he wasn’t sure if Jisung had figured that out. Even if Jisung could still hear with his ear, he couldn’t hear with it as well as before, so Viola took to herself to protect Jisung whenever Minho couldn’t do that. Because Viola felt what Minho felt, and Minho thought it was important to protect Jisung, so that’s what Viola did every time Minho couldn’t, for example during those times that Jisung went to visit the town by himself as Minho was a bit busy with figuring out how in the hell he was supposed to grind the lavenders for the healing potions.

  
No, potions weren’t his forte.

  
Minho really liked it in his little cottage. He liked the feeling, he liked the solitude, he liked that he and Jisung could go nearly a day without speaking a word, just… existing in each other’s presence. Talking and noise and having to constantly be aware of his surroundings and all that, they exhausted Minho to a certain degree, so now that Jisung was finally letting go of that wall he had kept on for so long, Minho could finally breathe and allow himself to loosen up. Don’t get him wrong, Jisung’s presence hadn’t been all that exhausting before either, as Minho had been used to his little quirks and so on, but now that he had finally managed to dig deeper and get Jisung out of that shell he had kept to please people, he could finally breathe. Let himself go. Allow himself to be and trust Jisung to alarm him if he noticed anything off in their living space. Minho liked it, he liked having someone to trust, even if it had taken him quite some time.

  
Yet he still couldn’t shake off that feeling, what if, what if Jisung, too, would betray him? Tell everyone what he was capable of? Use him at his most vulnerable, get him to do things against his will?

  
Jisung wasn’t like that. Minho should stop thinking about it.

  
But a year had passed, and during that year, Minho had grown stronger. He was more aware of his magic, he knew mostly how he worked. He wasn’t all that good in fortune telling, nor potions, nor healing, but he was good at growing things. Creating things, for example, new spells. He was good at directing energy from himself to things that were not sentient. One thing Minho knew, that if a witch was good at creating and growing things, they most likely were good at destruction, too. Minho still hadn’t dared to explore that side of him.

  
A year had passed, and Minho still found Jisung staring at the sea from the shore. He had said that he could no longer feel the pull, but perhaps Minho knew better, perhaps Jisung still felt that call to him, after all, he had been on the seas for so long. The call just didn’t end, it didn’t stop, it would always be there. It had just momentarily been blinded by the sadness, but now the blood was pulling him back to the seas. Minho could see it from him, and he couldn’t deny it, that same voice had started to call him again, too.

  
Perhaps the time to return would come, sooner, or later, but it hadn’t arrived yet.

***

It arrived on a chilly morning, when Minho made his way through the morning dew to his little garden, as the sun peeked through the leaves and shadows left swirly patterns on the jungle floor. Minho circled the cottage to the backside, with a wooden bucket full of water (a bit enchanted, perhaps) in his hand, he was going to water his plants, tomorrow he and Jisung would once again take them to the market to sell them, and earn their living.

  
The sight in front of him made him drop the bucket to the ground, water splashed everywhere. A cold hand of anxiety clasped around his throat.

  
Dead. Every single plant. Dead.

  
The leaves had fallen to the ground, they had darkened, Minho accidentally stepped on one of them and it crumbled to ash underneath his feet. Minho crouched next to one of the plants, he stared at them in disbelief. The plants and vegetables all looked like… like they had had life sucked out of them. Like something had come and pulled that string of life out of them, and left them nothing but crumbly shells behind it. Minho swallowed. He heard wings flapping, and soon Viola landed on his right shoulder. She hooted softly and nibbled Minho’s earshell, before she took flight again and landed on top of one of the dead pumpkins. She stared at Minho for a while, hooted again.

  
Minho realized, that every single plant that Minho had touched with his magic, was dead. All the grass, all the trees around the garden, they were still growing happily, and had been left untouched. Minho’s magic had done this.

  
It was a sign. And Minho had known to wait for it.

  
With a sigh Minho stood up and took his bucket, before returning back to the cottage. Jisung was still snoring in the armchair, and Minho just wasn’t entirely sure how he was capable of sleeping soundly literally everywhere in any position. Minho always had difficulties with sleeping on the armchair, not that Jisung knew it, he didn’t need to know, because Minho knew that the boy would insist on sleeping in it every night, and he needed a proper sleep in an actual bed, too.

  
Minho went to prepare them some breakfast, as it was his turn to do so. Yesterday it had been Jisung’s, and Minho had had to wake the boy up to do that. He was a deep sleeper on those nights when he didn’t see any nightmares. Minho was glad he wasn’t seeing them as open as before. The wounds were healing.

Finally Minho managed to drag a drowsy Jisung to the breakfast table, as he got tired of waiting for the boy to wake up. His hair was a mess, it had grown quite a bit longer during the year, and he had to constantly push it from his face, tug the strands behind his ear.   
“What’s up? You look sour”, he mumbled after munching on a bread and trying to get himself awake for a good fifteen minutes. Viola had hunted herself a mouse and was eating it in her nest. Minho nodded towards the garden, they were sitting next to the dusty kitchen window, and from that window, they could see the garden.

  
It took a moment for Jisung to notice, what was out of ordinary. He nearly dropped his piece of bread, as the realization hit him. He turned with wide eyes to look at Minho:   
“What- what the hell? What happened?”   
Minho shrugged his shoulders. He wasn’t entirely sure, but he did have a hunch.   
“I think… I think it’s a sign.”

  
Jisung didn’t understand, he looked a little scared.  
“Sign of what? Is someone after us? Are we going to die? Oh my god, Minho, what if we’re going to die-“   
Minho shook his head, laughter tugging the corners of his mouth. Jisung should stop jumping into conclusions.   
“I think it’s my magic. It’s… uh… it’s not working as it used to.”   
Jisung raised his eyebrow: “What do you mean? Is there something wrong with your magic?”   
“I mean that this place has nothing to offer to me any longer. The surrounding energy is waning. Dying. I have nothing new to learn from this place.” Viola hooted in the corner, she agreed.  
“Oh.”  
“I knew this would come at some point, but I didn’t… think it would come this fast. It’s happened to me once before.”   
“Oh. Is it… a bad thing?” Jisung asked. He was curious, and wanted to push the topic further, but he was hesitant, Minho could see it.   
Minho shook his head again: “Not really. It just means that I can’t flourish here. I need to go somewhere else to seek answers to unlock more of my magic. You know, leave this please, leave it for the next person to find.”   
“Oh.”

  
A silence fell. Minho could hear water in the creek right next to the cottage rippling. Viola was grooming her feathers. Minho felt the air shifting, something seemed to click in place.   
“So, has the sea finally started calling you back to her yet?”

***

  
She had. It had taken a day for Minho and Jisung to pack everything they needed. They slept one more night at the cottage, and in the morning, they left. They bid their farewells, Jisung seemed a little shaken, a little sad, he got easily attached to places, while Minho didn’t. They left behind the cottage as they had found it – with a closed chest that had all the books in it, a little pouch of money, all the dishes and all that. The only thing they took with them was some money, clothing, and two swords, hanging from their belts. And Viola. Of course. She was happily sitting on Minho’s shoulder once again, hooting gently as they walked towards the nearby town, for the last time ever.

  
They didn’t stop at the nearby town, they knew they needed to go further. The town only had a few smaller vessels visiting every once in a while, and they most likely wouldn’t take them to sail with them. So Minho and Jisung continued their travel, arrived in the next little town the next evening, spent the night there in a little inn, and then continued on. The next day, the rocky road led them to a hill, and at the bottom of that hill, in a valley, was the city of San Juan.

  
Jisung was appalled, scared, even, it was most likely the biggest city he had ever seen in his life. Minho took his hand as they descended down the hill, a few carriages, pulled by horses passed them. They walked through the city, it was alive, it was warm and welcoming, yet at the same time so distant. They both knew they didn’t belong there. After roaming around the city for half a day, they finally reached the pier (they may have explored a few smaller streets and got lost and stuck and Jisung had really wanted to go visit a few boutiques, Minho, please, can we go, I want to see what that’s about, oh there’s a bookshop here, can we buy a book, please, I would really like to read more). The pier was large, larger than the one in Tortuga.

  
Jisung asked from the watchmen if they knew that any of the ships needed new sailors, and they pointed them towards one ship, tied further on the docks. Minho could see that they were loading barrels into the ship. Jisung took Minho by his hand again, that had become a habit now, and together they marched towards that ship. The captain had been a bit reluctant at first, but after Jisung and his perfect tactics in persuasion and speaking in general, they accepted them as part of the crew, at least until they would reach Vera Cruz.

  
They got in. They were sailors again.

  
Minho had missed the seawind threading through his hair.

***

Their new life began fairly easily. Or well, it began fairly easily for Minho. He was already used to working on ships that weren’t pirate ships, so he knew that the pecking order was strict, and mostly unfair. Jisung didn’t understand that at first, that’s why he got yelled at for stepping over the captain’s toes when giving advice on how to sail better, he got extra work, which only made him rebel more. He was clearly not a fan of working underneath the crown’s flag, but that’s all they had for now.

  
Of course, Minho helped him with that extra work as much as he could. They were both deckboys, as was expected, they were both new and young compared to the rest of the crew, lowest of the low. Minho was very much used to that work, but Jisung was not, and he just kept on complaining about having to mop the decks every other day and clean the kitchen and storage rooms the other day. His sail on Euryale had been much… easier than Minho’s, since there Jisung had been a normal sailor – a normal pirate, and he hadn’t really needed to take part in the daily cleaning or other stuff like that. Minho, on the other hand, had been a deckboy, so he was used to all of it. Including the splinters on his palms that came from all the mopping.

  
La Reina was a very normal cargo ship that transported goods from San Juan to Vera Cruz. It was large – not unbelievably so, but large nevertheless. It consisted of four storage decks, a main deck, and the upper decks. The crew slept next to the kitchen underneath the quarter deck, and the captain’s quarters were in the forecastle. Other higher-class sailors also had their own cabins on the quarter deck. La Reina had powdery white sails that had seen a little bit of the world already, they were a bit worn-out and not as white as they had once been. The three masts reached for the sky, high and mighty, and in the middle one was tied the flag of Spain.

  
All the crewmembers spoke Spanish, but luckily, so did Jisung and Minho. Only Minho’s Spanish was a bit stammering and stumbling, and Jisung’s wasn’t, he had clearly learned a few languages during his travels across the world.   
“You remember Boom? From our crew in Euryale? He was Spanish, and when I was still a kid, I insisted that he would teach me, so he did. He spoke only Spanish to me and then I had to figure out what he was saying. And also the village I used to live in was somewhat under Spanish rule, so, you know, I’ve spoken quite a bit of it”, he had explained to Minho. Minho had only learnt his Spanish from books, he had never properly used it, so most of the time Jisung just kept translating everything to Minho. He was very grateful for the boy.

  
La Reina had once been painted light brown, but the color had slowly worn out during the many years of voyaging. The wooden color peeked through the paint, the decks were mostly paintless already. The lanterns that littered the railing and the stern of the ship were painted white. Overall La Reina was a nice ship. Of course, the crew could have been nicer, but if Minho and Jisung just minded their own business, it wasn’t so bad. It got really bad, when they didn’t, though, as some of the men had started to pick on Jisung ever so often. They had tried Minho, too, but one bewitched look had been enough, and they had stayed away after that. They did stay away from Jisung as well, if Minho was present, but when he wasn’t, well… then not so much.

  
The crew had been very curious of Viola, and still were, naturally. The owl followed Minho everywhere he went, never leaving him from her sight, except on times when she was with Jisung. Minho could feel it, she didn’t like the ship. Well, she probably didn’t like sailing overall, they were quite far from land, but as long as Minho kept feeding her portions of his own food, she was fine. But Minho could sense what she was sensing, this wasn’t the place for them to be, either, merely a vessel to get there. After a week the crew had luckily got used to the owl’s presence, after all, parrots weren’t that rare of a sight on ships, why would owls be?

  
Jisung moaned in pain as he straightened his back, they were finally ready with mopping the lower decks. Minho could hear the waves against the hull of the ship a bit above them, they were a little below the waterline. Someone yelled on the main deck, Minho could hear something about taking the foresails down.   
“God, I miss Euryale. I’m sick of this crown shit, I just want to be a pirate again”, Jisung mumbled. Minho quickly shushed him, sent a glaring look his way.   
“Sorry. I don’t think there’s anyone but us, though”, Jisung smiled, a bit sheepishly, a bit apologetically. They weren’t supposed to be pirates, they couldn’t say a word about it, or the captain would hang them or make them walk the plank. Minho heard steps coming from above them.   
“Watch it. I’m not about to row us to some remote island once again.”   
“Yeah, yeah, sorry.”

  
Together they put all the cleaning supplies back to their own little closet at the back of the lowest storage, before hopping all the decks back to the main deck. Most of the crew was lounging around the main deck, some people were still eating dinner in the kitchen. That’s where Minho and Jisung headed as well. Meat stew and nearly burnt bread, nothing compared to the cookings of Raul and Seungmin. Viola picked meat pieces for herself from Minho’s platter, Jisung scrunched his nose in displeasure.   
“Maybe we should have waited for another ship.”   
“Hmmh, maybe.” Or maybe not. Minho felt like this was partially the right one, because Viola did so. This was just… a temporary solution to get where they were headed. Of which Minho had no idea about. Where were they actually going?

  
They had a few-week sail ahead of them, and then they would reach Vera Cruz. There they would have to perhaps find a new ship, a new purpose. Minho knew that Jisung would have preferred a pirate ship, but getting into one from places like that wasn’t exactly an easy task. Maybe they would just have to hope for an attack, and then not to die in the attack, and then hope that whoever was attacking would recognize them or Euryale, and take them in. But that required quite an interesting string of events, and Minho had learned that the universe was rarely on his side.

  
Jisung was dead tired, so as the night fell around them, they decided to go to bed. They had a corner for themselves in the crew’s quarters, two mattresses and one huge quilt. Because they only had one, they had pushed their mattresses right side by side, and slept there, under the same covers. It was… nice? Minho didn’t really know. Viola had made a little nest for herself from one of the spare shirts Minho had with him, and Minho listened to her even breaths, as well as Jisung’s light snoring. He had a habit of cuddling up to Minho, and more than once Minho had woken up with an arm around his waist. It was fine, he wasn’t mad about it or anything, extra warmth was always nice and Jisung was nice, naturally. That was all there was to it.

  
Or was it?

  
Minho couldn’t fall asleep. The crew had returned back from their evening activities, which included playing games and not drinking (unlike in pirate ships), to sleep. Minho knew there would be a nightwatch in the crow’s nest, and someone steering the ship, most likely the quartermaster or the bosun. Minho decided that he wanted some fresh air, as the snores all around him started to get on his nerves, overwhelm him a bit, perhaps.

  
He ditched the covers, Jisung stirred in his sleep. Viola woke up from her slumber, but Minho gave her a look that said stay and watch over him, and that’s what she did. Minho still couldn’t understand how the connection between him and the bird worked, but it just did. Minho tiptoed over and from in between the sleeping figures to the door, didn’t let out even the slightest of sound, as he opened the door to the main deck. He nodded at the bosun who was at the helm, he didn’t seem to mind Minho at all. After contemplating his next moves for a second, Minho decided to go sit at the forecastle deck, above the captain’s cabin. He knew he was quiet, he wouldn’t have to worry about it. He hopped up the stairs, circled behind the mast, and sat down on a pile of rope. He leaned his back against the mast and took a deep breath, as the moon in front of him created a bridge over the water. That same moon bathed the ship in silvery moonlight, drew long shadows over the decks and danced with the warm, flickering flames in the lanterns. A few clouds drifted over the sky, the wind pushed them over the waves gently. It was peaceful.

  
A week had passed, and many were still before them. It had been a bit over a year since Euryale had been destroyed, Jisung had woken up to nightmares on the anniversary night of the sinking. Then Minho had once again hugged the breath out of the boy, as he had sobbed in his arms about how much he missed Changbin and Chan and Felix and Hyunjin and Seungmin and Jeongin, and Minho hadn’t known what to say. He rarely did, he wasn’t good at consoling people. That made him feel somewhat useless.

  
Minho was unsure of so many things. He had been unsure of quite some time now, but now that he was on a ship sailing towards the unknown and he didn’t really have a proper heading in his life, he was suddenly unsure of everything. He didn’t still didn’t have a proper grasp of his magic, and he couldn’t really explore his powers on a ship like the one they were currently at. He had nearly already got caught, his notebook had fallen from his satchel and a crewmate had picked it up and told him he had drawn pretty weird pictures. Thank god the man wasn’t from the sharpest end of the bunch, and his eyesight probably wasn’t the best, either.

  
Minho was unsure of himself in other ways, too. He had used to be this… cold shell that didn’t really care about anyone but himself, because for years all those around him had just wanted to… use him or take advantage of his powers or betrayed him in other ways, but now… Now he just couldn’t stop… feeling. Or perhaps feeling wasn’t the right word, he was just… caring. For what? Jisung. And Viola. Minho had noticed that he was constantly looking out for Jisung, always asking if he was fine, trying to notice any signs of anything. Constantly worrying of and for him. Even if he didn’t need to, Jisung was self-sufficient, he knew how to use a sword better than Minho did, and he was smart and sharp-minded. He didn’t need Minho to look out for him. But still Minho did that.

  
Minho knew that Jisung had been infatuated with him. Back in Euryale, over a year ago. He watched how Changbin and Felix had acted around each other, how Hyunjin and Seungmin had acted around each other and realized that Jisung most likely felt the same way about him. Or at least he was quite sure, since Jisung didn’t really spend time with anyone else, and he had constantly looked for Minho’s attention. Minho didn’t understand it, he was nothing special, he had been distant (still was a bit), given him a cold shoulder all the time, but still those little stars had lit up in Jisung’s eyes every time Minho as much as nodded at his questions. It had been odd for Minho, very odd.

  
But it was in the past now. Jisung didn’t act like that anymore, he had got… used to Minho’s presence, and the infatuation had disappeared as they had got closer to each other during the passing year. Minho was fine with that, duh, he had no other choice. How about he himself, then? Minho had been… interested, he could say that. But he knew it would have never worked out, for many reasons, most because of his own issues. That interest had been forgotten once they had been torn from their past lives to the current one, then he hadn’t had time to be interested, as he had just learned how to survive, and help Jisung survive. The loss, the sorrow, the grief, all that, those had made sure that whatever feelings had been shared in between Minho and Jisung had died out. To Minho it was relieving. Jisung was worth of someone that knew how to listen and keep him company and stick with him and wasn’t scared of people, let alone trusting anyone. He deserved someone better, in other words.

  
“Here you are!” The sudden whisper woke Minho from his thoughts and startled him. So much for that constant awareness.   
“I woke up and didn’t see you and came searching for you”, Jisung sat down next to Minho. He sounded a little worried.   
“Oh, sorry, I just couldn’t sleep and needed some fresh air”, Minho mumbled quietly, not to wake the sleeping captain underneath their feet. Usually Jisung was a deep sleeper, what woke him up during this hour?   
“It’s okay, just reminded me of the time when Felix was constantly missing and sitting alone on the deck during nights. Right after his first heist, I don’t know if you remember, we weren’t all that close back then.”   
“I remember.” Oh, he did. Felix had been moping days on end over the boy he had managed to kill in the heist. It had been very understandable, though, after all he still hadn’t been hardened by the world back then.

  
He probably was now.

  
“I still miss them”, Jisung whispered as he crossed his legs and leaned against the mast. Minho didn’t turn to look at him, just stared at the horizon.   
“Me too.” Did he? Perhaps he did. They were still the ones that had made Minho the most comfortable, excluding the time Minho had spent with his mother in his childhood. Minho missed that comfort. He missed them. Especially Felix and Chan, who had known of his magic.

  
The wind rustled the sails, Minho could hear snores emanating from the crew’s quarters. Their lanterns danced against the water’s surface; the moon illuminated their way in the blue darkness.   
“Minho, can I ask you something?”   
“Hmmh.”   
“How did you end up on Euryale? Like… what’s your story?”

  
Minho hadn’t expected that. He remained quiet for a while, and that while was a little too much for Jisung:   
“I, I mean, you don’t have to tell me if you’re not comfortable, I know it’s hard for you to trust people, I get that, so don’t worry about it, I’m just a bit curious, that’s all –“   
“Jisung, it’s okay”, Minho interrupted Jisung. He glanced at the boy, who smiled that same signature sheepish grin of his. Could Jisung be trusted? Could Minho tell him everything? Had he ever given Minho a reason not to trust him?

  
“I, uh… it’s somewhat of a long story.”   
“You know I’m always up for long stories.”   
Minho smiled slightly at Jisung, before he returned to the very beginning in his mind:   
“I was born on a little island close to Singapore.”   
“What?!” Jisung nearly shrieked.  
“Jisung, quiet.”   
“I’m sorry. What?! I thought you were from… here.”   
“Well, you thought wrong. I was born in a village, there were like… a hundred inhabitants, probably. My mother was a witch, my father was just a… normal human, I guess. There were a few other witches, too, and they didn’t live in secrecy. The village was just that, a little village that had a couple of witches living in it, we thrived, everyone knew each other and so on. It was peaceful, it was lovely, I liked living there with my mother and father. We were a happy little family.”

  
Minho paused for a moment. He swallowed, before continuing:   
“Until we weren’t. Other people didn’t like to see us thriving. Some men, I don’t know, from somewhere far found out that there were witches and underneath the village, in the ancient caves were diamonds and gold. It only took one night for the men to burn down the whole village. The last thing I remember is my mother shoving me into the woods with a satchel and yelling at me to run and hide and never look back, and that’s what I did.” But he did look back, and the last memory he had of his mother was when she ran back into the flames to try to save his father.

  
“But not far enough. The next morning, I returned. Everything was burnt to ashes. I found no one, but then the men found me. Instead of killing me, they decided that they needed a new deckboy on their ship, I was “given a chance”, as they said. I was thirteen at the time.”

  
“I kept my magic hidden, I knew better than to practice it in front of the strange men. My mother had always told me to not trust anyone, and not to use my magic in front of those who didn’t understand it, so I didn’t. Until I did.”

  
“Through many stops and two years, I ended up in Portugal, Lisbon. I spent there a good while, until I suddenly came across another witch. I befriended them, and decided to stay there for a while. Through them I got a few other friends, who I blindly ended up trusting, and they… uh… well, used me for their own good. Without even realizing, I was getting rid of their enemies for them. The men weren’t just regular sailors, my friends were thieves and other lower-class folk. I ended up poisoning one man, because my friend wanted revenge. I thought I was doing the right thing and helping, but then I heard that the man who I had poisoned had done nothing that my friend had told me that they had done. I couldn’t stand the guilt, I was fifteen and I had used my magic for bad things, which my mother had always told me not to do. I left for the seas again.”

  
“This time the quartermaster found out that I was a witch. I was scared, but he told me that he wasn’t going to tell anyone. Then he started pressuring me to do things, or he would tell the captain, who was a very religious man. I had to… do things to him… and for him… until I refused, and he told the captain, as he had promised. I had to escape the ship to stay alive. They tried to shoot me. I played dead in the water, and when they sailed off, I swam to the island that was close by. From there I found a village that was quite close to the one I was born in, the villagers weren’t afraid of magic, because there lived a witch. He took me in, taught me things, I spent there over a year. Then the same happened that happened to us in that little cottage, my magic didn’t respond to me anymore as it had done before, and I knew that I had to leave. So I did.”

  
“Little did I know that the village I had spent time on was on Ile de la Tortue. On the other side was none other than the town of Tortuga. I had finally found people, who didn’t hate me for being me. I found the witch you have bought plenty of charms from, her name is Eyria, by the way, I spent with her a few months, she taught me a few things of my magic, until she suggested I’d go look for more from the seas, because, you know the pull towards the waves, I had it too. So I did, I boarded a ship, sailed with the pirate crew, trusted no one. That’s how I lived, I changed crews every half a year so that no one caught on what I was doing, I kept on looking for myself, but just… didn’t find it. I got into trouble a few times for my magic, I had to flee once more as I got caught, but I always found myself a new crew, and if I didn’t, I stayed with Eyria. I didn’t leave the Caribbean seas. Then Captain Seo walked into the boutique that Eyria owned and told me he wanted a witch, so I left with him. And that’s how I ended up on Euryale. You already know the rest.”

  
Minho finally turned his eyes from his hands to Jisung, who was staring at him, mouth agape. He hadn’t uttered even a word when Minho had been speaking. He looked like he was in disbelief. So. There it was, the whole story. Minho had left out only the parts that made his chest burn. He had trusted Jisung enough to tell him everything.   
“You… wow”, Jisung finally wheezed.   
“Yeah”, Minho laughed. Even he himself knew he had been through a lot.

  
“I… thank you for trusting me”, Jisung mumbled, “You have seen like… the entire world. That’s amazing. And also I’m sorry you had to go… through all that. I’m just, sorry, I don’t know what to say, I’ve just been a pirate since I was like, ten years old and spent my time sailing only on Euryale at the Caribbean, you just… wow.”   
Minho chuckled at Jisung’s stammering. He turned his gaze away from Jisung to the horizon in front of him once again. The moon continued her travel over the sky. Then he had to turn his head back, because Jisung continued talking:

  
“You, uh, I just want to tell you one thing…” Jisung lowered his voice, his gaze shifted, for a moment it was like he didn’t dare to look Minho in the eyes. Until he finally did, and oh, how much they were filled with honesty.   
“I just want to tell you that, whatever comes, you can trust me. I will never, ever use your magic for my advantage, or for my own good. I will never ever betray you like those people did. Never. You can trust me. I want to be worthy of your trust.”

  
A smile tugged the corners of Minho’s mouth, until he let it spread on his features. Something warm stirred inside his chest.   
“Thank you, Jisung. You are worthy.” And so, so much more.

***

A week passed by. Minho felt somehow… freer. Telling Jisung things that he had told no one in years had somehow set him free, taken off that burden from his shoulders. At first Minho had been a little scared, would Jisung treat him differently now? Would he think Minho was disgusting, that he had poisoned someone just blindly like that, that he had had to do things against his will and forget his dignity like that? But Jisung just acted like himself. He chatted, he laughed, he slept with his arm around Minho’s waist, face buried against his shoulder. He didn’t treat Minho any differently, and Minho was grateful for that. Very grateful. He really had someone to fully trust. For the first time in years.

  
Yesterday one of the crewmembers had questioned them what the deal between them was, were they lovers or just friends, they seemed to be very close and Jisung had cheerfully answered that they were friends, really close friends, they had been sailing together for quite some time. For some reason, that had stung Minho’s chest. It hadn’t sounded… right.

  
It was a cloudy day, slightly windier than usually. Minho and Jisung had been assigned to clean a few storage rooms, as a barrel of wine had broken and spilled all over the little room. Ha, Minho remembered the same thing happening on Euryale, only then it had been Minho and Felix cleaning the decks. Minho cherished that memory. Luckily the wine hadn’t spread that far, and it shouldn’t have taken Minho and Jisung that long to clean it, but perhaps they were doing everything very slowly to avoid more work. They simply didn’t feel like listening to bosun’s orders for the moment.

  
Jisung hummed to an old sea shanty as he worked, Minho listened to him in silence. He very much preferred this Jisung, the one who didn’t force himself to talk. The one that was himself, only talking and smiling and laughing when he felt like it. Minho could visibly see the change every time a crewmember sat with them on lunch or dinner, how Jisung just mindlessly chatted away, even if Minho tried to nudge his foot with his own to signal that he didn’t have to do that. But it wasn’t an easy task to get rid of that habit, Minho knew that, and Jisung was already getting better at… being himself and not hiding behind that mask of joy and chatter.

  
Also, that chatter had nearly got them into trouble, as Jisung had nearly slipped that they had been pirates (still were, probably, that thing just didn’t leave the person). Minho would have very much preferred that the crew wouldn’t find out anything about them, as it would most likely not end up very well for them.

  
All day Minho had had this… growing feeling of anxiety inside of him, but he didn’t say anything. He didn’t want to worry Jisung. It wasn’t really related to anything, but he just felt like something was going to happen. He had felt it a few times before, too, the latest being the time when Felix’s father had destroyed Euryale. He hated it, he somehow knew that something was going to happen, in the near future, but he didn’t know what. Just something. That’s why he kept Jisung close to him the entire day.

  
Suddenly he could hear wings flapping, Viola flew from the upper decks to Minho. It was odd, she didn’t like to be in the hull, she rarely followed Minho there, something was wrong. She landed on Minho’s shoulder, hooted, sounded very alarmed and tugged Minho’s hair with her beak.   
“What? What’s wrong?” Minho asked the owl, who only hooted again.  
Jisung looked alarmed, a little worried: “Is something happening?”

  
And then they heard a yell, coming from the upper decks:   
“A ship with no flag approaching! Emerald green in color!”   
Followed by a shriek: “It’s a pirate ship!”

  
Minho and Jisung just stared at each other for a moment. A pirate ship. In here. Emerald green. Emerald green. Emerald green.

  
Odysseus.

  
“Shit. Shitshitshit”, Jisung cursed under his breath. Odysseus, one of the most infamous pirate ships in the Caribbean, if not the whole world. Led by Bang Yongguk, also known as the man with seven faces, and his enchanted katana. Minho, who usually kept his cool and was familiar with all things witchy, had a cold shiver running down his spine. Odysseus. That was the stirring in the pits of his stomach. That was no good.

  
“Get the guns and swords! This ship does not go down with those pirates!” Minho heard a yell from the main deck. They didn’t recognize the ship, did they? They didn’t realize that the only ship more ruthless and powerful on these seas was the Flying Dutchman.

  
“You two down there! On the main deck right now!” the bosun’s voice reverberated through the decks, it was meant for Jisung and Minho. Minho simply nodded at Jisung, who had a stir of fear in his eyes, and together they left their cleaning supplies in the little storage room and walked up the stairs to the next deck.

  
“This ship won’t last. Not in front of Odysseus”, Jisung whispered.   
“I know”, Minho whispered back.   
“What do we do?”   
I don’t know. Minho didn’t say it, he didn’t dare.   
“Just stay close to me.”

  
Minho and Jisung reached the main deck, and immediately someone handed them swords.   
“You’ll be on the main deck welcoming them to your open arms. Remember, they’re just pirates, they’re not even human!” Oh, that the bosun was right about. They were not human. Not Bang Yongguk, oh no, he was something more, and even if Minho had never met the man, he knew there was something familiar about him.

  
He could feel the familiarity approaching from their left. Jisung took hold of Minho’s arm, Viola flew in circles above their heads, screeched loudly twice. She was ready for a battle, Minho was not. The sword felt heavy in his hand. He wasn’t a swordsman, both him and Jisung knew it. Jisung was, oh, he was, he was magnificent with swords, but neither of them had any idea, how his worse hearing would affect his capabilities in action. Neither of them had held swords ready for a fight since that night. The night that they had lost everything. And now, they would have to fight again.

  
But against who? Odysseus was going to win, that was certain. La Reina was going to lose, and Bang Yongguk didn’t leave survivors after him. So how in the seven seas were Minho and Jisung going to survive? Anxiety, mixed with fear gripped Minho, always so cool and calm and collected, and now he was panicking. He couldn’t lose Jisung. They had got so far, they still had so much ahead of them. They had to survive. Had to.   
“Stay close to me”, Minho mumbled again to Jisung, just as the bowsprit of Odysseus sailed next to them.

  
The sailors around them were surprisingly calm, they had got their guns and cannons ready, there were at least twenty people standing on the main deck, ready to attack with their swords. La Reina had faced pirates before, too, hadn’t it? The people around Minho seemed to be so sure that they were going to win, that this would be just another attack. How on earth had they never heard of Odysseus? Or did they just not recognize the ship.

  
Minho gripped Jisung’s hand as the large ship sailed right next to them. The emerald paint of the ship seemed to glimmer, the red sails were full of wind. Cannons peeked through the little outlets in the hull. Minho swallowed. He saw no one. Not a soul aboard Odysseus. It was dead quiet, just the waves crashing against two ships. The air seemed to still, Viola quickly landed back on Minho’s shoulder.   
“What the-“   
“What the hell is going on?”   
“What? Where-“   
And suddenly, black smoke erupted from the decks of Odysseus. It traveled over to their ship, and within a blink of an eye, it had engulfed the entire main deck of La Reina. Minho could hear shrill screams all around him, confused yelling, what the hell is this, witchcraft, what kind of pirates are these, and he gripped Jisung’s hand harder. He could feel Viola rising to her wings again, she flew out of the smoke.

  
“Minho, what the hell is going on?” Jisung’s voice sounded muffled through the smoke. It was just that, smoke, the smoke itself wasn’t threatening. Minho shushed Jisung, they couldn’t use their eyes, they had to use their ears. The smoke itself wasn’t a threat, but what hidden inside of it, was.

  
Complete silence. Minho couldn’t hear the waves anymore, nor the sails rustling. He only heard his own breath, felt Jisung’s hand in his.

  
Then the screaming began.

  
And Minho knew that there was no easy way out of this.

  
He felt the surge of energy coming towards him, snapped his fingers together and sent a ball of ghost fire towards that energy. He heard more yelling, someone pushed him, he threw another ball of that blue fire. Jisung kept his hold of Minho, Minho had abandoned his sword the second he had realized he’d have to use magic. More screaming, the pirates were hidden inside the smoke, they were killing the sailors. Minho heard gurgling. Something dropped to the ground close to him, Viola screeched from somewhere above him. Another ball of ghost fire. The light of the blue fire was useless in the engulfing black smoke. But it did land on something, and it did hurt someone, because Minho intended it to do so.

  
Minho felt it before he heard it. Three blades, coming towards him. He pulled Jisung behind his back, before casting a binding spell towards those blades, and he heard them clatter against the wooden deck. More screaming, no one knew what was going on. Then, suddenly:   
“Jisung, behind”, Minho whispered, and Jisung slashed blindly somewhere behind him, they both heard a grunt, Minho cast another binding spell, and something heavy dropped on the ground. Probably a pirate.

  
Suddenly there were too many people, too many pirates coming towards them,   
“Jisung, behind, slash all you can”, and he did, Minho let go of his hand and he pressed his back against Minho’s back, as Minho blasted binding spells and ghost fires out of himself into the smoke, he head grunts, one got too close, then Viola, screeching, flew through the air into that threat’s face, Minho could hear a surprised yell, muffled by the smoke. It wasn’t just smoke. It was pure magic, and meant for distraction and destruction.

  
Minho forced Jisung to back, towards the railing of the ship, so no one could get behind them. He was scared, he could feel it from the way his hand reached constantly for Minho, and oh, how Minho would have loved to hold his hand, but they weren’t safe yet, and he needed both of his hands to keep the… pirates away. Thankfully Viola felt what Minho did, and landed herself on Jisung’s left shoulder.

  
“Who the hell are these two?” Minho heard someone say from the smoke, before he shot a particularly strong ball of ghost fire towards that voice. Then he realized, that complete silence had fallen again. The screams, the gurgling had stopped, and the stench of death wafted through from the smoke.

  
And then it started to disappear. Slowly the smoke swirled towards the skies, the grey afternoon light seeped through again. Minho could hear the waves, the wind. Viola hooted, she was alarmed, but not too much. Jisung reached for Minho’s hand again, and Minho took the boy’s hand in his.

  
Because as the smoke disappeared from around them, they could see that they had been circled by at least twenty pirates. Some of them had their swords pointed out towards Minho and Jisung, some weren’t in attack mode, just curious who was deflecting all of their attempts at attacking. Bodies laid everywhere on the main deck, all of them the Spanish sailors’. Minho swallowed, he felt agitated.

  
A tall man stepped on the gangway leading to Odysseus. He walked over the plank. He had a blood red kimono on, that had been left open. Multiple dark tattoos covered the man’s chest, rose to his neck, some swirled on his cheeks. Minho gripped Jisung’s hand, took a small step back. The katana on the man’s hip seemed to glimmer, even if there was no sunlight.

  
“My, my, what do we have here?” Minho heard a low voice, it seemed to shake him to his very core, it made La Reina’s wooden deckboards tremble. The man walked up to the main deck, stopped in the middle. He had his hands behind his back. Minho didn’t dare to look away.   
“A little witch and two of his little companions.”   
Minho swallowed again. He wasn’t sure anymore if the fear gripping him was real, or made by magic. The man took a few steps closer, and then Minho saw them, in the grey afternoon light – white crosses underneath the man’s eyes, a row of them traveling down his neck. Prominent, not faint.

  
Something in his mind seemed to click in place. Minho’s shoulders relaxed, the fear let go of him. His grip of Jisung’s hand loosened a little.   
“What’s your name, little witch?”   
“Minho.”

  
He knew. The man knew, didn’t he? Minho felt it, he’d need to get aboard Odysseus, then he would be on the right track again.   
“Minho. What about your companion’s names?”   
“Viola and Jisung.”   
“Ah, Jisung, a familiar name. From Captain Seo’s crew, I believe. What a sad story, that ship.”   
Minho didn’t say anything, his eyes were glued to the man in front of him.

  
The man glanced at his crew that had gathered around him, and then Minho again.   
“Well, then. Welcome aboard Odysseus, Minho, Jisung and Viola. I hope your time with us will be pleasant”, the man with the seven faces smiled.

***

  
Odysseus was as gorgeous as it was welcoming. It was nothing like Minho had imagined from the stories and rumors – the crew (yes, initially a little distant and examining) had welcomed him, Jisung and Viola with open arms among them. Unfortunately they had been assigned to work as deckboys again, and Jisung had spent the evening complaining (Minho didn’t mind, he was so used to it, and knew that he would enjoy working on Odysseus far more than on La Reina). They had got themselves a mattress and a hammock in the crew’s quarters, and perhaps Jisung had seemed to be a bit sad about that. Minho couldn’t really figure out why.

  
The red sails rustled in the wind, the emerald paint on the ship seemed to glimmer in the sunlight. No wonder the whole ship was so… fancy and there were so many stories and rumors about it, it was led by a witch. Bang Yongguk, the man with the seven faces. The captain of Odysseus. The crew had explained to Minho and Jisung what the entire seven faces-thing was somewhat about – the captain always wore a mask to the battlefield to cover his identity and witchy marks, as it kept rumors going more easily but apparently that was not all there was to it. Minho could feel the captain’s magic all around the ship, he was clearly powerful, but not in a terrifying way. The magic was similar to Minho’s, he understood it somehow.

  
Bang Yongguk was a nice man, or perhaps, a witch. He worked with his crew, he didn’t just steer the ship and yell orders, occasionally he joined Minho and Jisung to mop the lowest decks with a few others, he dined with his crew, he wasn’t distant. Jisung was afraid of him, he believed all the rumors and stories about the man, even if Minho tried to explain that they were mostly just that – rumors.

  
Or well, perhaps they weren’t just rumors. Bang Yongguk was a powerful witch. He was capable of sinking entire ships to the bottom of the sea if he so wished. And some of the crewmembers seemed to be… odd in a way that wasn’t from their reality.

  
Minho and Jisung were sitting on the railing on the main deck, simply basking in the afternoon sunlight. There wasn’t much to do, they were just sailing around, finding more ships to heist as they weren’t in a hurry to sail back to Tortuga, and the captain didn’t want to voyage to other seas just yet. It had been two weeks since Odysseus had sunk La Reina and Minho and Jisung had switched ships. Apparently Odysseus never left survivors even if the sailors claimed to be former pirates, but Minho’s spells had caught Bang Yongguk’s attention, and he had spared them, luckily.

  
And Minho felt like he was in the right place. He was somehow going to the right direction with Odysseus, and that was why he suddenly trusted the captain. Or perhaps trust wasn’t the right word, but he was a witch with white marks, who had spared their lives, he couldn’t be all that bad, and neither Minho nor Viola felt any kind of threat on the ship.

  
Jisung was so much livelier than he had been on La Reina. He was with his own kind now, people laughed at him and with him, and he just had so many stories to tell, and Minho knew it was because he wanted to keep the tale of Euryale and Captain Seo going. He didn’t want them to be forgotten, he wanted them in the history books, in the tales told in taverns and pubs, sung in the Sunken Sailor’s Inn. His friends, their friends, deserved it.

  
And perhaps, in a way, Minho hoped that those stories would reach Felix, if he was still alive, and he would know, that someone out there was still telling the story. Someone out there was still alive, and he wasn’t alone.

  
Somehow it warmed Minho to think that even if Jisung was chatty with the crew, he had slowly learned to be just… himself with them, too. He had started to understand that he didn’t need to fill in the silence for the others to like him. He had already got a bunch of friends from the crew (and Minho tagged along, because he simply didn’t feel like being alone) by just being himself. That had torn out the last pieces of doubt from him. He could be sad or frowny or happy or just… not feel a damn thing and people would still like him. Because that’s what he naturally was – likeable. Lovable, perhaps.

  
Yeah. Minho had noticed that, too.

  
With boarding Odysseus came finally the feeling of security and contentment. Minho didn’t need to look after Jisung anymore all the time, and Jisung didn’t need to look after Minho all the time. They were free, of sorts, they didn’t have to watch their speech or over their backs if someone had blown their cover. And Minho could be what he was – a witch. He had never done that on any ship freely. Now he could just… cast little spells to help himself (and Jisung) work and no one batted an eye. He was part of the normal. Minho had never been part of that before. It was nice. He felt… free.

  
And with that security and contentment, Minho had time to think and examine and realize things, and he had realized, in between all too long gazes and light giggles and Jisung tugging the hem of his shirt, that that infatuation Minho had felt over a year ago before Euryale had exploded and sunk, had returned.

  
And it was stronger this time. Minho didn’t like it, it had him panicking for a moment, and then he realized that it was just that, infatuation. It had passed before, it would pass again, because Jisung didn’t feel the same, and he deserved so much better than Minho would ever be able to give him. After all, he was a witch, a prince of darkness, a wretched thing, and Jisung was everything and so much more in Minho’s eyes.

  
When Minho had exactly realized there was still something in him towards the other boy? A crewmate had asked them if they were lovers. Again. And again, Jisung had shaken his head laughing and told her that they were just friends. And that had stung. Again. More than the last time.

  
So Minho had decided that he would just let the infatuation pass, he wouldn’t poke around the feeling, he wouldn’t acknowledge it, and it would fade away at some point, as it had done before. He sighed and leaned his head against one of the bigger shrouds holding the main mast. Jisung’s knee touched his, as he sat next to him, holding on to another shroud. They didn’t really have anything to do, they were just waiting for dinner to be served.

  
“Minho. The captain wants to see you”, the quartermaster suddenly called from the quarterdeck. Jisung turned to look at Minho, slightly alarmed. Minho threw his legs over the railing and stood up. He tugged the hem of Jisung’s shirt, and he got the signal, and stood up as well. As the quartermaster noticed this, he continued with:   
“Just you, Minho, it’s something important.”   
“If I come, then Jisung comes, too.” Minho was adamant. He wouldn’t go behind closed doors without Jisung, not anymore, no matter how unthreatening Odysseus was now that they were part of it. And Minho didn’t want to face Bang Yongguk alone. No matter how nice and how white his marks were. And perhaps Minho just didn’t want to go without Jisung.   
“Fine”, the quartermaster finally gave in, and Minho and Jisung rose the stairs to quarterdeck. The captain’s cabin was on that deck, behind the helm, below the upper quarter deck, as it had been on Euryale. As it was on most ships.

  
Before Minho had time to knock on the door and open it, Viola descended on his shoulder. Apparently they were not going anywhere without her either, and she confirmed that with a soft hoot. Minho knocked on the door, Jisung looked quite scared, but not too much, so he opened the door into the darkness.

  
The captain’s cabin was dimly lit with candles and lanterns from the corners that daylight didn’t reach, there were a few bookshelves and paintings covering the walls. A crystal ball, another on a chest in front of one of the bookshelves. Windows at the back let in the afternoon light, bathing the room in a soft glow. On the floor was a soft, emerald green rug, and in the middle of it, and in the middle of the room, was a large, deep brown, fancy desk, and behind it, sat Bang Yongguk. Minho swallowed, as his eyes met the man’s.

  
“I see you brought the whole trio. Come sit”, he said with his low voice and nodded towards the armchair in front of the desk. Before Minho had time to say anything, another armchair slid through the room next to the other one. They were red, contrasting against the green. Minho, under Bang Yongguk’s somewhat pressuring gaze, sat down on one of the chairs. Jisung sat on the other one, Minho could feel how he didn’t like the situation. He also knew that he would have insisted on coming along, no matter what.

  
“I need to talk to you as a witch to another witch. I see your powers have not reached their peak quite yet, but you aren’t far from it, am I correct?”   
“You are”, Minho nodded at Bang Yongguk. The man with the seven faces.

  
Then he actually understood, where the nickname came from. The captain’s face seemed to… shift all the time. His features shifted, not visibly to a non-witch eye, but visible to Minho, even if just slightly so. So that was where the nickname came from. This man had obtained seven souls to become powerful, and those seven souls still lingered around him.

  
“That’s fine, you’re already powerful, more powerful than I was at your age. By the way, Jisung, nothing spoken in this room will be talked about once you exit, I hope you already understood that. Now, Minho, as you know, a witch’s powers tend to shift from time to time, and sometimes, when used too much, they seem to drain away for a while before returning again.”   
Minho nodded. He had experienced that a few times, he had used so much energy that he had collapsed. Last time was when he had rescued himself and Jisung and tried to keep the other boy alive.   
  


“Good. You have also noticed that this ship has a protective spell on it at all times, and it alarms me, when something is approaching. That spell drains my energy all the time, and if I don’t take it down sometimes, I will collapse and be out for days.”   
Minho nodded again. So that was the reason why they hadn’t heisted in the past two weeks, even if they had seen some ships. Their captain was out of energy.   
“I’m not asking you to create another protective spell, as the center of your magic clearly lies elsewhere, but I am asking you to watch over the ship, while I take that spell down and rest for a few days.   
Minho nodded. He could do that. It wouldn’t be hard, right? Viola could fly around to search for threats, while the captain rested, and Minho would sleep with one eye open.

  
“Good. Be mindful that the seas we are currently sailing in are rather busy, and there’s traffic all the time. I hope your familiar will be able to protect us for the night.” Viola hooted, she would be able to do that.

  
A grin stretched over Bang Yongguk’s rippling features:   
“Great! I’ll take the spell down tomorrow morning, after that, you will be in charge of protecting Odysseus.”

  
***

Time flowed as it did, the day turned into another, and Minho felt it, when the captain took the wards off of the ship. He felt them vanishing, felt the energy surrounding the ship disappearing. The captain locked himself in his cabin to rest, no one was allowed to bother him for the next few days. According to the crew this wasn’t a new thing, but usually they were docked in Tortuga, or in some little bay on a lone island so that no one would find them and bother them. This was new, them still continuing to sail across the seas.

  
But they had Minho now, and now Minho had responsibility, and that terrified him a little. Jisung helped, though, as much as he could, or at least he tried, as he had nothing but his eyes to spot possible threats. A day passed, then another, Minho let his guards slowly fall, there were only a few days left, and they had only seen a few ships pass by in the horizon. No one had approached them, so why would anyone approach them in the next few days, either?

  
Minho spent his time working, he even joined a few card games and played with the crew (only because Jisung wanted him to) and sat on the forecastle in the evenings, Jisung by his side. It had become so natural, wherever Minho went, Jisung was with him. Sometimes they shared a silence, sometimes Minho told him little bits and pieces from his past, he told him about the magic and how it worked, tried to help Jisung understand what the energies meant and how they worked, what was the difference between black crosses and white crosses. Sometimes Jisung told him about life on Euryale before Minho had joined their crew, he reminisced in the memories, basked in them. Bitterness was gone from his voice. He didn’t regret those memories anymore, they didn’t hurt like they used to.

  
Everything was calm. Quiet, just days passing after another, soon Bang Yongguk would return and his energies would be restored, and he would be able to protect the ship again. That was the reason for Odysseus’ success, wasn’t it? A trained crew, a witch for a captain and countless rumors, that kept the wrong people away from them.

  
Until everything wasn’t calm anymore.

  
“Minho, hey, Minho, there’s a ship approaching”, the quartermaster yelled one evening. The sun had already set, the evening glow was a memory, and darkness had started to fall around them. No one but the quartermaster (and Jisung, of course) knew that Minho was in charge of protecting the ship for the moment.

  
Minho felt the blood in his veins seize, but then he rationalized; oh, it’s probably just a cargo ship or something, they will leave us alone if we leave them alone, as he rose up from the floor of the main deck, Jisung after him and hopped up the stairs to the forecastle deck. The crew was eyeing him a bit suspiciously, as one after another they followed Minho to the forecastle deck. The quartermaster pointed out into the darkness, and oh my, there it was, a ship approaching them, quite fast, and it wasn’t just any kind of small ship.

  
The blood that had just seized in Minho’s veins turned cold. A feeling of terror washed over him, pure and unapologetic. The ship approaching wasn’t just any ship. It wasn’t a merchant ship. Nor a cargo ship.

  
“It’s a warship”, Minho wheezed out as he gripped the railing in front of him.   
“What?!” The quartermaster shrieked, the crew behind Minho gasped, he could hear some incoherent mumbling. His head was pounding. A warship was approaching them, and by the looks of it, it had recognized Odysseus and was going to take it down. Minho could hear yells emanating from the ship, something about cannons, something about getting ready.

  
“What the hell are you waiting for? Do something!” The quartermaster sounded panicked, and for a reason, their odds were not in their favor, even if Odysseus was scary and their crew was fearless, but they were not ready for a battle right now, and they didn’t have their captain.   
“I-“ Minho mumbled.   
“Are you a witch or not? Do something!” Someone yelled, and Jisung pressed a hand against Minho’s shoulder. He didn’t say anything, he didn’t need to, he was there, that was enough.

  
What the hell would he do? What the hell was he going to do? He wasn’t at the height of his powers, he was just… a witch, not even a proper one.   
“Fucking useless! Take your guns out, get the cannons ready, get ready for a battle! The captain might not be here, but that doesn’t mean we won’t win! We are Odysseys, for gods’ sake!”   
“Minho?” Jisung called out in a small voice.

  
The panic was taking over. Bang Yongguk, one of the greatest witches of their time had trusted him, and now Minho couldn’t even complete this little task because of his own incompetence? He wasn’t a witch, he was just… nothing. Not worthy of the magic in his hands. The warship was approaching, and it was approaching fast, there were only a few hundred meters in between them and that ship, and Minho was panicking, what the hell would he do, he had to do something, he had been trusted with this job, what the hell?!   
“Minho…?” Jisung called out again.

  
Suddenly Viola landed on Minho’s shoulder and a bit angrily tugged one of the strands of Minho’s hair, before hooting. Focus, she said, Minho felt that.

  
Minho was a witch. Perhaps not a proper one yet, but he would be, he had to, that was his goal. Minho’s center lied in creation, he was good at creating new spells, they worked more easily for him than most of the other witches. But with creation, came destruction, and that was the thing that kept Minho from being a proper witch, because he didn’t dare to explore the destructive side of his magic. With creation came destruction, they walked hand in hand, as they did with Minho.

  
With creation came destruction.

  
This was it, wasn’t it?

  
The destruction.

  
“Jisung, let go of me”, Minho told the boy next to him, who let go of his arm. He looked concerned, but Minho didn’t have time to focus on that. Euryale had been exploded by setting the gunpowder barrels on fire. In front of them was a warship, and there were tons of gunpowder in it.

  
Destruction. Minho needed fire. He had to set their gunpowder storage on fire.

  
This was the time.

  
Minho closed his eyes, he could hear yelling behind him, guns being readied and swords clattering. He focused on one thing, and that one thing was approaching from the front. Jisung called out his name once again, Viola took flight and hooted again. The energies in front of him were all different, some living, some not, all things had some kind of energy surrounding them, and Minho was looking for that one specific energy, he needed that, it was stale, he knew it, not living, he kept his eyes closed, searched, searched, searched, the ship approached, Minho felt overwhelmed from all of the energies barreling towards him a little too fast and there, oh, there, there it is, that’s the energy he was looking for, stagnant and slow, yet so easily exploded.

  
Minho lifted his arms in front of him, he needed to direct his energy by using his entire body.   
“Minho, they’re getting closer”, Jisung mumbled, and oh, Minho knew that, he needed to hurry, he really needed, so he did that, he gathered every single little ounce of energy that he had in him, ghost fire should do it, it was an easy spell, but with enough energy it would be destructive, so destructive, Minho felt the energies running in him, gathering around him, mirroring the energies gathering in one place inside of that ship, that bloody warship, and there, there, that was enough, that had to be enough, Minho didn’t have any more to give, it had to me enough, Minho prayed it would be enough.

  
He opened his eyes. The ship was directly in front of him.

  
And snapped his fingers.

  
One second,

  
two seconds,

  
and the warship exploded.

  
A blue flame set the gunpowder on fire, erupting, exploding the entire ship with it. For a moment the whole world around them was illuminated by blue light, Minho heard the crackling fire, the screams, the yells, the ship looked like a blue torch, the flames licked the wood and reached for the sky.

  
And the heat, it was nearly unbearable. Enough to burn the bones of those inside the warship.

  
Perhaps Minho had put a little too much energy in that.

  
“Holy hell, Minho”, Jisung mumbled, astonished.

  
Yeah, Minho had definitely put too much energy in that. He had none left in him.

  
The last thing he remembered before the darkness engulfed him was Jisung’s arms around him, as fell down on the forecastle deck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh wow.... look at that...... look at the little witch go and do his thing.... wow.....
> 
> ngl this one was really fun to write! i hope y'all enjoyed it as much as i did writing it! 
> 
> [twitter](https://twitter.com/dulcetchan)   
>  [curiouscat](https://curiouscat.me/dulcetchan)


	3. Year three: Feeling

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ‼️ Notice that this is a double update, and the epilogue has been updated at the same time with this one ‼️

Minho’s eyes fluttered open to a soft glow seeping through the windows of the crew’s quarters. There was a blanket wrapped around him, he was feeling all warm, yet weak. Minho grunted, scrunched his nose as a few wisps of hair tickled his face.  
“Hey, you’re awake”, Jisung softly mumbled next to him, and Minho turned his gaze towards the boy. He squinted as the daylight coming from behind Jisung made his eyes sting a little.  
“You decided to put up a little show in there, you know? Got the whole crew all baffled with your little tricks.” Jisung’s speech was soft, he had a fond smile on his face. What on earth was he talking about- Oh. Right.

  
The warship.

  
Minho had destroyed it. Lit it up like an oiled torch. Sunk it down with just a snap of his fingers.

  
Minho tried to struggle up, he gasped for air as every single joint in his body protested any sort of movement.  
“Hey, easy there, tiger”, Jisung muttered, before helping Minho up to a sitting position by holding his hand and supporting him from the back. Minho was still weak, he could feel that his energy levels were low, he knew that he wouldn’t be able to summon even the tiniest ghost fire flame in between his fingers right now.

  
Minho was sitting on the mattress that was meant for Jisung, right next to his own hammock.  
“Sorry, we thought it would be best to put you on a mattress since we didn’t really… know if you’d have any… after… effects”, Jisung continued with his soft voice. There was no one else in the crew’s cabin, Minho could hear distant yelling from the main deck. He could recognize the captain’s voice.  
“How long was I out?” he croaked, his voice was hoarse. Long. Too long.  
“A day and a half”, the fond smile reached Jisung’s eyes. Minho found himself wanting to stay in the moment, wanting to bask in those warm brown eyes of Jisung’s in the soft sunlight. Minho sighed, Jisung handed him a glass of water, which Minho took with shaky fingers. He downed the entire drink at one go.

  
The water brought a surge of energy back into his body, he’d need something to eat, too, but he wasn’t sure if his legs were strong enough to carry him to the kitchen just yet. Minho heard rustling from the pile of clothes next to his head, and soon enough, Viola’s head peeked out. She had clearly been taking a well-deserved nap.

  
“What… what happened? I, I mean… I don’t know, what’s going on?” Minho asked, turning his head towards Jisung again. He was sitting next to Minho, legs crossed, hair tied to a messy bun. He looked a little tired, like he had been… awake the whole night.  
“You tell me. You just… lit up that whole ship and it exploded and then you were out like a candle. Lucky I was standing next to you, otherwise you would have fallen right on the ground and probably hurt your head. Even some of my eyebrow hairs burnt off because of the fire!” Jisung wasn’t angry, he had laughter laced in his voice.  
“Anyway, after that we decided to carry you here because we had no idea what was going on, only that you were still breathing and I figured it probably had something to do with the energies, and then we just… left you here. Or the others left you. I didn’t. I’ve been staying up the whole night becauseiwasworried-“ Jisung’s voice faded away towards the end, Minho could see the red creep up to his ear.  
“I- I mean, I just… watched over you in case something would happen. But you’re awake now! How are you feeling?”

  
Minho’s heart felt all warm, which stung a little.  
“I… uh… dizzy. Weak”, Minho muttered. Viola, with her little owl feet hopped to Minho and nudged the side of his leg with her head. Minho smiled at her, she hooted softly. Jisung nodded at him; “She’s been looking over you, too.”  
“How about the captain? Is he… okay?” Minho asked.  
“Yup, got back on the deck and the wards up a few hours after you passed out. He sounded quite delighted when he heard what you did. Apparently that ship had been an annoying one, following after the Pirate Slayer’s steps. Or sails, in this case.”  
“Oh. That’s good, then.”

  
If it was good. Was it good to torch dozens of soldiers alive? Minho didn’t really know, his moral compass had never been the one to point north. And he had done it for his survival. And Jisung’s survival. Not really for the rest of the crew. So, who cared? It was either them or the pirate crew.

  
Based on the sunlight flooding through the windows, the day was closing into the evening. Minho felt tired, his body ached, and his soul ached. But it was a good ache, somehow. He had done something right, hadn’t he? He had learned something new of himself, he could read energies better than he had thought, and he had taken the magic of destruction in his hands and used it. Perhaps he had blown it out of proportions (literally), but he had used it nevertheless, properly for the first time in his life. And he hadn’t killed anyone he hadn’t meant to. Hopefully.

  
“O-oh, by the way, you may want to take a look into this…” Jisung suddenly handed Minho a mirror, with its back facing up. Minho hadn’t even known Jisung owned that (or perhaps he didn’t, it could have been borrowed from a crewmate). Minho turned the basic hand mirror around to look at his face (that’s what Jisung meant, right?)

  
And nearly dropped the mirror from his hands.

  
Minho gasped. He simply stared at himself, unable to say anything.

  
He wasn’t the same anymore, oh no. Correct, he hadn’t looked into a mirror in a while, last time being in their little cottage, but back then he had been different. Now he was… a witch.

  
Two white crosses, little x-markings, decorated Minho’s skin underneath his eyes. They contrasted against the sunkissed skin, bright and clear as a day. He raised his other hand and slightly touched the white mark under his right eye. The skin was a bit raised, as if the white marks were scars of some sort. Then he realized that his fingers had the same crosses, too, an uneven number of them in each finger, following along the bones underneath his skin. The marks on his fingers were much, much fainter. Then Minho quickly moved the mirror a bit downwards, his gaze following, and there they were, little crosses dotting down the lines of his neck, they, too, much fainter.

  
The faint crosses would get stronger, if Minho continued to practice his magic wholly, in every single way he was meant to, he knew that.

  
Destruction. Creation and destruction. Destruction had been his final trial, the last thing standing between him and becoming a true witch. One of those, that were pure of their soul. Minho was a proper witch now. He had finally reached his goal, he was a witch, a true witch! Mom, I did it, I really did it, I did it for you!

  
Minho hadn’t even realized the smile that had spread on his face, as he just stared at the crosses on his fingers, the handheld mirror abandoned on the sheets next to him. He was so… happy. He had finally, finally reached this moment, and god, it had taken him so long! He had found his center, and he knew how to use his magic, he knew his limits and what he was good at! He was finally a witch! Finally!

  
A little giggle escaped through Minho’s lips, Viola hooted softly again, she sounded very delighted, and Minho could feel the happy energy surging from her. Minho lifted his gaze from his hands to Jisung, who just… stared at him. With that same fond expression on his face.  
  


“I’m proud of you”, he finally mumbled. The warmth spread from Minho’s chest, it tingled the tips of his fingers, curled his toes. He let himself feel it, for once, he didn’t push it away. Minho didn’t really… know what to say. Thank you? That felt a bit… off. So instead Minho leaned in a little, and pulled Jisung into a hug. A tight one, or as tight as he could do, he was still feeling weak and fragile. Jisung, a heartbeat later, answered to the hug, Minho could feel the laughter rumbling from his chest. He was happy. God, he was so happy, for that moment.  
“Thank you, Jisung. I wouldn’t have done it without you.”

  
After a moment Jisung pulled back, and Minho could swear Jisung’s eyes were glistening, just a bit.  
“I’m sure you would have, sooner or later”, he mumbled, a smile still tugging at the corners of his mouth. Minho shook his head, oh no, it had been Jisung all along, without him he wouldn’t have ended up in that little cottage, he wouldn’t have ended up on this ship, and he wouldn’t have ended up using his powers against that warship.

  
Minho simply stared into Jisung’s eyes, and perhaps it was him still being weak, and tired, but the world seemed to fade away, just for a moment. The yells from the main deck quieted down, the sunlight seemed to shift, Minho realized that he was still holding on to Jisung’s hand from the hug. He admired the boy’s face for a moment, he admired his eyes, how he still, despite the world having been so cruel to him, still had those kind eyes, that little smile playing on his lips. Minho admired the scars slitting though his features, a little rough, a little coarse but oh, so charming. He admired the cupid’s bow, the lips, the jaw, just… him. Jisung was so beautiful. Minho hoped the boy could see it himself.

  
Jisung suddenly turned his eyes away, his ear red, the blush had creeped up to his nose as well. Viola hooted and hopped on Minho’s thigh, before tugging the sheets with her beak. The spell that had fallen was broken, the sounds coming from outside flowed in through the door again.  
“I- I think we should get you something to eat so you’ll feel a bit better and get your energy back”, Jisung stammered. Minho felt the tips of his ears heating, just a bit, he wasn’t the blushy type like Jisung.

  
But why was the boy blushing?

  
“Yeah, that would be smart.”

  
***

Time was an odd one, at one moment it moved fast, and then it didn’t seem to move at all. A week had passed since Minho had got his marks, and every now and then he was testing his powers, just a bit, a spell here and there, just to ease the cleaning tasks. But he didn’t dare to go all in, not when this wasn’t his ship. Not when there was Bang Yongguk, the man with seven faces, breathing down his neck.

  
Not literally, of course. A few nights ago, during dinner, the captain had sat down in front of Minho, and they had chatted about his magic for a while. Bang Yongguk now knew that Minho’s center was in creation and destruction, but in turn, Minho didn’t know where his center lied. Protection was a strong part of it, that was for certain, as holding up wards for a long time was not easy, and it was very energy-consuming. What was his other thing, then? If he could protect, then he could also-

  
Ah. The black smoke. Invasion. Protecting meant security and safety, invasion took that away. Hah. Minho had cracked the code without the captain’s help (not that it was much of a code to crack, anyway).

  
The captain and Minho had discussed magic for a bit, until Bang Yongguk had left a little threat, just a small one, hanging in the air between them. It had been left unsaid, but a few things were clear to Minho: Bang Yongguk was far stronger than he was. Minho was only one witch, but Yongguk had his own soul and seven others with him. Bang Yongguk also wasn’t that fond of other strong witches on his ship, which meant that Minho needed to stand down, at all times, give space for Bang Yongguk’s own magic. And their centers weren’t that different – but that meant that they clashed. See, witches were usually rather territorial, if the other witches on one’s area used similar sort of magic. If the other witches bore different centers, then that clash didn’t happen, and instead the magic used could complement each other.

  
But that wasn’t the case now, and it was starting to irk Minho. It wasn’t a good thing, but he wouldn’t do anything, he’d just let it be, as this was not his ship, and he wasn’t close to the captain. What irked him the most was that he couldn’t practice his magic properly, not that he would have been able to even if there wasn’t any other witch on the ship, but because of exactly that – they were on a ship. Minho couldn’t just go around and destroy things, otherwise he would have been made to walk the plank.

  
Oh well, the days passed, there was a heist, in which Minho helped by tearing the other ship’s masts down from far away. That was all he got to do with the other side of his center. Jisung stayed behind during the heist, he simply helped carry the cargo on their ship, as he still didn’t trust his ear, even if it had been over a year already, and he had got used to hearing a bit differently.

  
Or perhaps there was something more to it, Minho felt like there was. Jisung had told him that he didn’t trust his hearing to survive from a sword battle, but Minho felt that there was more to it. And he was usually right when it was about Jisung.

  
A day after the heist the captain had stood in front of the helm, high and mighty, and with a booming voice he had announced:  
“My dearest crew. Let’s go back to our dear mothers’ waiting arms. Sails towards Tortuga!” And the crew had cheered, and Minho had smiled, he had missed Tortuga, its rough streets and rougher people, the noise, the bustle, even if it was overwhelming at times. Jisung had looked, happy, too.

  
But something was off, Minho had noticed it. Jisung didn’t seem so… happy anymore. At first, every morning, he had gazed out in the open with the widest smile Minho had ever seen, and now he just… didn’t do it anymore. He was often in his own thoughts, more often than before. He wasn’t so cheerful around his new crewmates. The change in his behavior wasn’t that easy to notice for someone who hadn’t known Jisung for long, but Minho had, and he knew that something was off.

  
And that is why he climbed up to the mast of Odysseus one night, when everyone else had already gone to sleep except for the quartermaster, because Jisung was a look-out for the night and Minho couldn’t sleep without his presence next to him. Viola followed after him, she hooted a few times, before flying out to the open. Minho let her do it, she needed to stretch her wings.

  
Jisung had heard Minho approaching, he helped him up to the crow’s nest. He looked delighted, that warmed Minho from the inside. And he shouldn’t be thinking that.  
“What brings you here?” Jisung asked, smile tugging the corners of his mouth.  
“I couldn’t sleep”, Minho answered, truthfully. They both sat down in the crow’s nest, backs against the mast, and they shouldn’t probably be doing that, because right now neither of them could see what was happening behind them. But they weren’t worried, the wards were up, Viola was circling the ship with her wings flapping, and she would tell them if they were in danger.

  
The world around them was bathing in silvery moonlight, the sails rustled gently behind them. The foremast didn’t have any sails open. The shrouds creaked with the slight wind that was just gentle enough to push them across the ocean.  
“What’s wrong?” Minho finally broke the silence.  
“How so?” Jisung asked, he sounded a bit confused. The spyglass in his hand was gilded.  
“You seem off. Is something bothering you?”  
“Oh”, Jisung muttered. His gaze slid from Minho to the horizon, into the deep abyss ahead of them.

  
“You don’t like it here, do you?” Jisung mumbled after a few breaths of silence. Minho cocked his eyebrow at him:  
“Not exactly. I mean, being on a ship is fun and all that, I like sailing, but… well, you were there, you know how the captain feels about other witches on his boat.”  
Jisung nodded. Of course he had been there, sitting right next to Minho. He always was.  
“Do you… want to get away?”  
Minho shrugged, he didn’t know. He was a witch, he had the entire world ahead of him and so many possibilities that they overwhelmed him and he did not want to think about them. He was just content. He wanted to be wherever Jisung was.

  
“I just…” Jisung muttered: “I just… I don’t know. It’s not the same anymore.”  
Oh?  
“What do you mean?” Minho moved his gaze from the sea to Jisung. He examined his side profile in the moonlight.  
“It’s just… sailing isn’t the same anymore.”  
Ah. Minho nodded in turn, now he understood. Now he understood, why Jisung wasn’t so in love with the abyss anymore.  
“It’s just not the same. I mean, it’s still fun and all that, I like this ship and crew and c’mon, this is the goddamn Odysseys, and I had never even in my wildest dreams thought about sailing with Captain Bang Yongguk, but here we are. But it’s just… it’s not the same without them anymore”, Jisung sighed.  
“I just miss them, I really do. And sailing isn’t the same without them, no matter how hard I try to get new friends. I just know I’ll never get any as good friends as I was with them… you know, I’ll never get friends anymore who I have known since childhood.”

  
It hurt Minho’s heart to hear that. But he nodded, nevertheless.  
“And I just… maybe I never was that much in love with sailing. Maybe there never was that actual pull to the sea, but a pull towards friendships and company and acceptance that came with sailing on a pirate ship. I don’t know. Maybe it was the people that made sailing fun all along.”  
“Maybe”, Minho answered. He wasn’t all that surprised, to be honest. He was glad Jisung had figured that out from himself.

  
“So I was just thinking… what if we just… stayed in Tortuga? Or something. I don’t really have a horrible need to sail, I just, I don’t know, want to live and do something, but I want to do it with you. And you’re not happy here, because your magic is clashing with the captain’s, and also you like security and you don’t like change all that much and sailing is nothing but change at times, so I just thought that we could… just settle down for a while?”

  
Minho liked the fact that Jisung talked about them as… them. Neither of them would go anywhere without the other, that was the deal now. They were together in this, the two remaining ones, and they would be that… until the end? End of what? Minho didn’t want to think about it. Instead he hummed at Jisung’s thought, he… approved of them.  
“I don’t know what we would do in Tortuga, but it would seem like a better option since you won’t get yourself beheaded for being a witch and there would probably be some people we know and… maybe we could just find a way to live there. I mean, there are other people living there, surely we could fit in just as well. And you could practice your magic. At least better than here.”

  
Living in Tortuga with Jisung? Perhaps it could work. Minho knew there weren’t that many witches around, only Eyria and perhaps two others, they would fit in just fine. The city was big enough for all of them. And Tortuga was full of abandoned and a little less abandoned buildings, they’d find one for them. What would they do there, then? That was still a mystery. But they’d manage, they had each other, that was all that mattered, wasn’t it?

  
“Yeah, that could work”, Minho mumbled after a few moments of silence. A smile spread on Jisung’s face, he had most likely been expecting the worst.  
“We’ll make Tortuga our new home, then.”

***

And a home they made.

Or well, it took them a little bit of time.

  
Tortuga was just as Minho remembered it to be. Secretive. Thrilling. Loud. Overwhelming. Bordering on unhinged. Minho liked it, it was easy to hide in its shadows, they didn’t feel threatening to him as they did to most of the people. Minho’s satchel was hanging from his shoulder, Viola sitting on his other shoulder, as he walked along the pier towards the marketplace in front of the little city. It smelled like fish, beer, and something rotten. How so very Tortuga. The pier was alive, someone yelled right next to Minho’s ear something at his buddy, there were multiple crews dragging wooden boxes on their ships. It was mid-day, the sun was scorching the city underneath it, sparing no shadows of its light. Tortuga felt surprisingly peaceful today.

  
Jisung walked along the pier right next to Minho on his right side, he had a slight grin on his face; he had missed the city as well. He had missed the bustle, the noise, even the shadows, all that. He also had his bag with him, his knuckles brushed against Minho’s every now and then, as they walked side by side towards the city of Tortuga. Minho felt… excited. He hadn’t thought he would feel that way, but he did. For some reason he couldn’t get to know the city better, to become part of it, to become one of the shadows lurking in it, luring people in.

  
They had bid their goodbyes to Bang Yongguk and the crew of Odysseus. Or well, perhaps bidding goodbyes was the wrong thing, they had merely said “byebye” as most of the crew had left the ship before them, all on their merry way to drink down their treasures, others busy running into other places. But Bang Yongguk had had no hurry, and to him Minho had simply said “thank you for your hospitality, we appreciate it”, and the captain had nodded and understood, what Minho had meant. They weren’t coming back. They were going to stay in Tortuga, search for other adventures, which they still had no idea of. Their future did not lie within Odysseus.

  
A few pirates recognized Jisung, but not Minho;  
“What the hell, mate! We thought ya were fish food!”  
Jisung grinned at them, “You can’t get rid of me that easily!” and after that he turned towards Minho, and way quieter added “Not when I have a witch on my side.” Minho simply snorted at that statement. It made his heart flutter. Minho pushed that thought aside.

  
The marketplace was full of life, naturally, Minho listened to the cacophonous screaming, rolled his eyes at the alleged hex-selling stalls that certainly weren’t real, and stared one pickpocket down, as he nearly dared to approach Jisung. Soon they reached the main street, which led them up the hill, before fading into the jungle behind the city.  
“So. What’s the plan now?” Jisung asked Minho. Minho looked around for a bit, at all the pirates walking up and down the street, disappearing into the smaller alleys, all the little boutiques and bars and taverns and brothels that drew in people. Yeah. What now? Minho and Jisung hadn’t really discussed it. They both had their bags full of money they had got from that one heist they had had the chance to attend (Minho had got a little more from the captain as a thanks for protecting the ship), so they could stay in inns for at least a few weeks (it had been a small treasure ship they had heisted). But Minho didn’t really feel like that, and what was the point of staying in inns if they were going to start living in Tortuga, anyway?

  
“Hm. Let’s go see Eyria, perhaps she’ll have some advice.”  
Jisung’s face lit up at that. Minho didn’t know if Eyria would help them, she was a very proud witch, and she could be very peculiar. But it was worth a shot, and that look on Jisung’s face. And perhaps Minho had missed the lady, after all, he had spent some time with her before being recruited by Captain Seo. And if she were to have any advice, it would be good advice.

  
So that’s where they headed, then. They both knew the way. Up the street nearly halfway, Jisung nearly fell on the uneven cobblestones as his foot caught on one of them, there were some drunken yells coming from the pub close by. And because they were in Tortuga, the yelling naturally developed into a bar fight, and Minho had to duck his head to avoid one of the jugs that flew his way. Soon they turned onto a smaller street, one of those quieter ones. On those quieter alleys the scorching midday sun didn’t keep the shadows away. Minho felt them lurking in the corners, in the even smaller alleys. He heard giggling, he heard scratching. Jisung didn’t seem to mind the noises. Sure, the street wasn’t all that small yet, there were still a few inns and taverns and brothels, but a little less people. A little less bustle. It wasn’t so overwhelming anymore. Minho really wasn’t the type to adore big crowds.

  
From that street they turned onto another alley. There were even fewer people, the cobblestones turned to mud. It had rained a few days ago. They didn’t need to walk for long, as the door to the familiar little boutique appeared in front of them. Minho breathed in; the souvenir shop looked just the same as it had done two years ago. Jisung turned to Minho, and Minho nodded at him, he could go first, so that was what he did. Minho followed after him into the dusty darkness of that little boutique.

  
Everything was just the same as the last time. It was like the shop had been stopped in time. The walls still looked charred, like they had once been burnt down. There were jewelries hanging from fish hooks along the walls. Shelves, cupboards, chests, everywhere, a few tables with absolutely everything stacked on them. Candles lit their way in the shop, since the windows were blocked with heavy curtains. Crystal balls, old clothes, a glass box full of snakes, books, more books, one of them caught Jisung’s interest, the shop was overwhelming, but so very dear to Minho.

  
And before he knew it, the lady he had been looking for stepped in from the shadows behind the counter at the back. She, too, had been stopped in time, her black locks still had white stripes in them, her dark skin was decorated by white crosses. She had violet robes on, and a gentle smile appeared on her face, as she recognized Minho.

  
“My, my, I knew they couldn’t kill you that easily. I see you decided to take a friend with you from Euryale.” Her voice was smooth, it glided over the air. As her eyes studied the marks on Minho’s face, the gentle smile widened, just a bit;  
“Let me guess. Creation and destruction.”  
Minho nodded. Yeah. Perhaps he was a bit proud of that.

  
Eyria turned his eyes to Jisung, who was looking at them quite curiously. He flinched, just a bit under the witch’s intense gaze.  
“And you! I hope you aren’t here to shop for new charms, because I have none for you.”  
A slight blush dusted over Jisung’s cheeks:  
“N-no, ma’am, not this time.”  
“Ma’am? Psh.”  
Minho snorted, as Eyria rolled her eyes at Jisung. She wasn’t serious. She was in a good mood, Minho could feel it. He still knew her, he still remembered how she acted. Thank goodness.  
“Minho, I want to know everything. How did you get your marks? Where have you been for the past… two years, has it been since Euryale sunk? Heavens, I can’t remember! It’s like the time has stopped for me, it simply flows on and I forget it. I have become a little foolish, I forget things often nowadays. Come, come, my children! I’ll brew you a cup of tea, and then you can tell me, what has been going on for you for the past two years!”

  
Jisung had never seen the lady acting like that, she was always calm and collected, and scary, but… something had clearly changed. The lady disappeared through the door at the back, Minho took Jisung by his hand as he led them in through that door. Viola stepped a bit closer to Minho, nuzzled his ear, she could sense something, couldn’t she?

  
From a small hallway to the kitchen, Minho remembered these little rooms. The kitchen was a little dusty and messy, there were a few unclean pans and pots on the table. On Minho’s left was another little room, who he knew to be the witch’s bedroom. His room had been upstairs, but now the stairs were filled with books and boxes of miscellaneous things, blocking the way up. From the ceiling hung all kinds of stuff – little charms, talismans, a few ropes that led to wherever. The witch was searching for a clean pot, as Jisung explored the house, just a little, he peeked in from the bedroom door, paled, and gasped, before quickly returning to Minho’s side.  
“M-Minho, I, I think, you should, take a l-look.”  
Jisung looked frightened, and Minho half-guessed, what he had seen, so he peeked in there, too.

  
And sure enough, there was a violet-clad corpse, lying on the bed. It didn’t reek, thankfully, there were spells blocking that. Minho nodded at Jisung, there was nothing to fear.

  
No wonder the shop seemed to have been stopped in time. The witch had been stopped in it, as well.

  
Well, she had always sworn that she would not rest until every last one charm that she had made had been sold.

  
“Come sit, children, and tell me everything!”

  
***

  
“My, my. That old captain of Odysseus. And now you’re here. You had me worried, Minho, two years and not a sound from you. For a while I thought that crownsman had got you, too.”  
Minho simply shook his head, his teacup was empty in front of him. Jisung was fiddling with his own, his empty as well. Their story hadn’t been that long, but Eyria liked details, so Minho had had to tell her everything.

  
“What are you going to do now?” she asked. Minho was a little sad that he no longer saw the glimmer of life in her eyes. Minho shrugged, he still had no answer.  
“We have thought of… living in here. And that’s why we came to you. Any advice?”

  
The witch in front of them seemed to think about the question for a moment.  
“Hm. I know there are a few empty buildings in this city close to the center. You could take one of those as your own. As for surviving here, well, as you know, witches can make some good money around here. Find a way to offer services, spells or hexes or something. Steal my business idea. As for your human boy… well, I don’t know what he’s good at, find something to do for him. Make him your sidekick or something.”  
Minho couldn’t help the little smirk tugging the corner of his mouth. Jisung just snorted, he didn’t dare to say anything.  
“I guess we’ll do that, then”, Minho nodded.

  
“There’s a former painter’s house, an abandoned one, on the other side of the main street, a block from the Quartet’s Tavern. It’s been sealed with magic, open it, and it will be yours.”  
“We’ll do that. Thank you, Eyria. I hope time will treat you more fairly from now on.”

  
***

  
To the right from the Quartet’s Tavern, a block into the smaller street, and there it was, with dust covering its windows, and a spellbound lock in its door, the painter’s house. A few people passed by them, as Minho and Jisung were just staring at the house. It was quite a small one, and if it was built the same way as the others, the living quarters would extend towards the back, and in the front was the shop area. The shop’s windows looked similar to the other boutiques and shops around Tortuga, only they weren’t as dusty as this one’s were.

  
Minho focused his energy at the lock, and with a snap of his fingers, it exploded, just as the warship had done, but with much less energy. Jisung looked exhilarated, as he pushed the door open – and had to retreat back immediately, because there was so much dust that he got it in his lungs and was swept into a coughing fit. Minho patted his back, until Jisung got his breathing back even. With soft steps Minho walked into the shop, careful to not send any excess dust flying.

  
The shop was nearly empty. There were shelves along the walls, on some of them were still things that Minho couldn’t make out under the dust. There was an old rug on the floor. Behind the counter was another shelf, and on that Minho found paints and brushes that looked old, but were most likely still in condition to be used. There was nothing on the counter. The windows let in the afternoon sunlight, dust danced in the air as Jisung walked into the shop as well. He looked excited. Very excited. It made Minho’s heart flutter, and again, he pushed that thought away, and instead he opened the door behind the counter, that led him deeper into the house.

  
He had been correct, behind that door were the living quarters. They reminded Minho very much of their little cottage. There was a kitchen that was a bit bigger, Viola immediately took flight from Minho’s shoulder and decided that her nest would be in the corner. There was a round table and three creaky stools in the middle of the room. All the cutleries, pans and pots were still in place, they wouldn’t need to get those, thankfully.

  
Next to the kitchen was a bedroom. Minho was faced with a wide bed, that could fit two people. Good. Next to the bed, on both sides, were nightstands, and on the opposite wall was a large, wooden wardrobe. On the wall opposite to Minho was a window, that had been covered with dusty, old curtains. Minho would have to get new ones for them.

  
Opposite to that room was a little living room. That was also the room the painter had worked on, Minho could tell that by the easels that were still standing in the corner. There were a few bookshelves, full of books, a chest in the other corner that had been opened, it was empty, and in the middle of the room was a sofa and two armchairs, and in front of them was a coffee table. Minho could tell it was made of mahogany, and it had most likely been expensive.

  
From the little hallway that led to all the rooms, Minho found another door at the end. He destroyed that lock, too, and opened the door to a little yard. A garden. Minho would make that his garden, he decided right then and there. There were a few barrels and a hoe and a shovel left leaning against the wall of the house. Yup. Minho would get his garden. He couldn’t wait to get his hands into the soil in the backyard. Their backyard.

  
Minho closed the door, only then he realized that he had a stupid, little smiled splayed on his lips, and it didn’t go away, even if Minho wanted it to. He liked this. He really did. A home, he would get some stability in his life, a place to call his own, with his dearest friend, whom he found from the living room, pulling books from the shelves, with a wide grin on his face.

  
Warmth surged through Minho, spread from his chest at the sight of that. Jisung glanced at him, that grin turning a little shy.

  
Perhaps Minho realized then and there that he was a little in love with his dearest friend.

  
“C’mon, we have some cleaning to do, human boy”, he said instead.

  
***

  
The house started to show its colors with the cleaning. The living room had once been painted red, so Minho went and purchased a new paint, and then he and Jisung repainted it, made the red deeper. Perhaps it worked as a sort of a memoir to Euryale – after all, red had been one of the colors that Captain Seo had really adored. The kitchen they left as it was, familiar wooden color, that exuded warmth. Jisung wanted the bedroom green, so that’s how they painted it. Deep, forest green. Minho liked the color.

  
And with every stroke of the paint brush, he fell in love with Jisung even more. He didn’t really know what it was. Or perhaps he did. As the days passed, Tortuga brought out more of Jisung. He wasn’t on the edge anymore, he felt secure and safe, (even if they were in Tortuga). Minho had a hunch it had something to do with his own presence, but he was fine with that. In fact, more than fine – he really loved the idea that he was the one that made Jisung feel safe. Jisung laughed more, he joked around, he got green paint on his nose and Minho had to wipe it off, and with gentle fingers he did so, and there was a gaze so intense that it made Minho’s toes tingle, but he was most likely the only one feeling that, so he didn’t do anything about it. Jisung wanted to learn how to properly cook, too, so Minho taught him some basic recipes. And every evening, before going to sleep, he curled up to one of the sofas, took one of the old books on the shelves and started to read in candlelight, to learn even more about the world around him. It made Minho feel warm. It made the painter’s house feel like home.

  
They didn’t forget the shop side of the house either. After a week of getting the living quarters to a better condition, they started to clean the shop. They found a few spare canvases, big and small, and completely unused. More paints and palettes and brushes, some of them looked expensive. Jisung had stars in his eyes:  
“I could… I could try painting? I mean, I’ve, I’ve never really told anyone, but I really like painting. Or drawing. Drawing, actually, I never had any money for actual paints. Or time to paint”  
Minho smiled at him and nodded, Jisung was free to do whatever he wished.

  
Their money was slowly running out, so Minho had to figure out what to do. “Steal my business idea”, Eyria had said. Charms? Minho could do that. He could do little bottle necklaces and lace them with a little bit of magic, even if his center lied elsewhere. What would he do with his center, though? Could he somehow… sell his ability to create and destroy? Hmh. That was a great question.

  
They covered the windows with thick, dark green curtains, just to create the feeling of magic in the air. Soon, the shelves had started to get full. Minho found a few books, some magical, some not. A few crystal balls, he could sell those, he could read them on lucky cases, too, but it wasn’t all that easy for him. His center was definitely not in fortune telling, and the fortunes often came to him in bursts that he couldn’t handle, and he didn’t remember them afterwards. He just remembered the feeling they left in him, whether the fortune was good or bad or scary or thrilling.

  
A week turned to another, Viola had created herself a cozy little nest, all the paints had dried, they had decided to paint the shop dark violet. Minho had found himself some very witchy robes, and in them he sewed many pockets, and in those he stashed some worts and herbs and a little notebook and anything he would ever need in haste. On evenings he sat on the floor of the living room, and created magical little bracelets and medallions and necklaces, anything he could come up with. He didn’t put much of his energy in them, just a little, they didn’t drain him at all.

  
And during the nights, Jisung cuddled up to him. And Minho let him, even if it made his heart ache. He was too good for Minho. Too good for anyone, really. Minho only wanted what was best for him, and he certainly knew that he himself was not that. Didn’t even come close. Just a wicked thing.

  
Minho got his garden as well! And he was so happy about it! After three weeks his plants were growing rapidly, and soon he had made a deal with the tavern owner at the corner of the street that he would sell all the leftovers for him. And soon he changed the deal and turned it into orders, and after that, every week Jisung carried him a bunch of carrots and onions and potatoes and everything Minho was growing in his little garden. 

  
And soon they got their first actual customer. She bought a little charm medallion for good luck, and told them that she would definitely recommend them to her friends and crewmates. That’s how the reputation started circling, the Witch of the Painter’s House was the newest in town, and his medallions weren’t hoaxes, and soon they had tens of customers every day. Only in a month and a half.

  
“Minho! We need to celebrate this!” Jisung shrieked one evening. And the next evening, Minho let him pull him to a nearby tavern, filled with pirates and townspeople.

***

“Oh, there’s a table free!” Jisung yelled over the clamor and pulled Minho towards the corner rather close to the door. It was the same tavern that Minho sold his veggies to, the Quartet.  
“Minho, Jisung!” The tavern owner’s spouse greeted them with a wide smile. They had a few jugs filled with rum in their hands. Minho smiled at them a little, nodded as a greeting. He sat on a comfortable armchair, his back against the wall and face towards the door. Jisung had learned it by now – that’s how Minho always sat. He always left him the chair that was close to the wall, from where Minho could see properly around. If the tavern they went to didn’t have any free seats close to the corners, then Minho and Jisung usually found themselves another tavern. Minho had never had to explain that to Jisung, he had just… understood it. It warmed Minho’s chest.

  
And for the millionth time, he told himself that he’d have to leave the feeling be. Jisung sat in front of him on a stool, he had his hair tugged into a little ponytail, some flowing free. There was a lone candle in the middle of the little round table, dribbling stearin to its irony holder. The flickering flame of the candle accentuated Jisung’s features in a way that left Minho a little overwhelmed. The full cheeks, the cupid’s bow, the scars slitting through his face. The sharpness in his eyes that he had gained back in the past few months. He was happy, Minho knew it, that’s what the sharpness meant.

  
The cacophonous noise that consisted of the chattering, yelling, laughing and music filled Minho’s ears. The tavern was warm, welcoming. It hadn’t been that at first – it was perhaps a bit on the dark side. There were lonely, cloaked figures sitting at the corners, peering from underneath their hoods at the people passing by. Only half of the chandeliers were lit, and the upstairs of the tavern was always quiet, in an eerie way. When Jisung had asked about it, the tavern owner had simply told him not to bother himself with those questions. The tavern, its partially charred walls and dusty windows had felt nearly repulsive, but once Minho and Jisung had sat there in the evenings a few times, it had accepted them – welcomed them.

  
The same person that had greeted them at first brought them their food and jugs filled with port wine. Minho thanked them, and got a wide smile in return. Jisung struck up a small conversation with them, and Minho simply listened. The owners of the tavern had already learned that Minho really wasn’t the talkative type, but Jisung was. Minho also knew that the owner and his spouse felt a little uncomfortable in Minho’s presence, and who could blame them? He was a witch, after all, and not a very friendly one to people he didn’t properly know. 

  
“Have you heard? There are rumors of a new pirate crew.”  
“Are there really?”  
“Yup. The ol’ cap saw them sailing in front of the Spanish main. Emerald sails, that’s all he said, he hadn’t seen the flag before. It was a huge ship, apparently. We might hear of that crew a lil’ more in the future, I have a hunch of that.”  
“We might. Unless the Pirate Slayer attacks them, too. No one has survived from their claws.”  
“True. Let’s hope for the best.”

  
Minho eavesdropped into the conversation that was going on a few tables over, before Jisung turned back to him as the spouse of the tavern owner left to serve another table. Minho could see the tavern owner himself walking down the stairs that lead to the upper floor. The silent floor.  
“God, I’ve missed this!” Jisung beamed, as he poured himself some wine in his cup, before pouring some in Minho’s, too, but only half-way. Jisung also knew Minho didn’t like to drink all that much. He needed to stay in control of himself, especially in places where there was a slight danger lurking in the corners all the time. And Viola wasn’t there to protect them, she didn’t like loud places, so Minho had told her to stay home.

  
They both dug into their food, listening to the clamor around them. The food was delicious, as it always was (perhaps not as delicious as Seungmin’s cooking had been, though).  
“Did you hear? The word of us has traveled out of the island! That old man told me when I went to buy some new ink from him this morning.” Jisung had been painting and drawing quite a bit recently, and even sold one of his paintings.  
“The old man is also in this world only half of the time, so could be just bullshit”, Minho had to rain on Jisung’s parade. The smile on the boy’s face didn’t falter.  
“Oh, come on, Minho! You know it yourself, our rep has definitely circled around, we wouldn’t have that many customers otherwise. Did Eyria ever have as many as you now?”  
“In the early days, yes, but after a few years people forgot about her, and only the loyal customers stayed.”  
“Well, we’re going to be different.”  
Minho glanced at Jisung, his brow a little quirked: “How so?”  
“We’re going to come up with new business ideas. I don’t know how, but we will.”  
Minho snorted, but the little sparkle of mischief in Jisung’s eyes just kept on glimmering. Minho adored it. So much. “Alright. If you say so.”  
“I do.”  
“Good.”

  
And the conversation faded into smiles, before it flowed on again, without pressure, without haste. Minho glanced at the door every time someone entered the tavern, the night deepened around them, the Quartet was pretty much full already. Jisung’s nose got redder as the moments passed, he really liked the port wine of the tavern, perhaps a little too much. And as his nose got redder, his glances got hazier, and somehow, his eyes were on Minho all the time. And he had this stupid little smile on his lips, all the time, too. Stupid, because it made Minho’s heart race, and Minho would have rather not let it do that. Unfortunately for him, he was not in control of his own feelings.

  
They talked about the small things, the rumors Jisung had heard, the boutique owner around the corner had given birth to a little girl and Minho made a mental note to go gift them a little charm for the newborn. After all, the boutique owner had helped him with the garden and made him his robes. They talked about the big things, too, Minho felt his energies getting stronger, because the shop gave him the freedom to create, even if he didn’t dare to destroy.  
“You could tell people that you’re up for demolishing old buildings for pay.”  
“Are you serious?”  
“Yes?”  
“…I’ll think about it.”

  
They laughed, they shared silences, Minho noticed that he didn’t glance at the door so often anymore, not when Jisung was telling him an enticing story, when he was pulling him in with his words. God, he really had talent with words. He could be an actual writer. Perhaps Minho should tell him that, encourage him to write now that he had picked up reading, even if Minho knew that Jisung did that more to learn from the world, not to immerse himself in other people’s stories.

  
An hour turned into two, Minho lost count on how long they had sat in that little tavern. It was most likely late already, past midnight. Jisung’s speech had faded into silence, and as Minho glanced up, he noticed the boy staring at the table next to them. There were two girls, sitting hand in hand, sharing gazes and giggles. In love, clearly. The sight was beautiful. Love was beautiful. And so… distant from Minho.

  
Jisung sighed and Minho turned his gaze back to him. He was surprised to find the boy frowning. The happiness had disappeared from his eyes.  
“What’s wrong?” Minho felt his gut twist, and not in a good way. He didn’t like seeing Jisung… sad. Not at all.  
“Nothing”, the boy mumbled.  
“Jisung.”

  
Jisung sighed, leaned back on his chair. He fiddled with the hem of his shirt, he knew there was no getting out of this. With a voice much quieter he continued:  
“I just… do you just ever crave for love? For someone to… I don’t know. Love you?”  
Oh, Minho did. He most certainly did. Not that he was going to tell that to Jisung. That could have made him uncomfortable, and Minho didn’t want that.  
“Hmh”, he simply hummed, neither agreeing nor disagreeing.  
Jisung stayed silent for a few moments, “It’s just. Nothing, it’s stupid”, he then mumbled again. His demeanor had changed completely.  
“Nothing is stupid, Jisung. You can tell me what’s bothering you”, Minho reassured the boy. Even if he partially didn’t want to hear what he had to say, because he didn’t want to shatter that little spell where he had lived in the past month, in that little spell he and Jisung were happy. As just friends.

  
“I just. I don’t know. I kind of want to experience that. Loving. Being loved. That would be nice.” By the slur in Jisung’s speech Minho could tell that this was most likely the drunkenness in him speaking. Not that it wasn’t just as valid, but he knew Jisung most likely wouldn’t tell him these things sober.  
“You’re still young, Jisung, you have plenty of time to-“  
“It’s not that. It’s just, I don’t think I ever will”, Jisung cut him off. Minho raised an eyebrow at him. What the hell did he mean by that?  
“I mean… C’mon. Look at me.” Minho did. “I’m broken.”

  
Minho’s mouth fell open, he was appalled. He didn’t have time to say anything, before Jisung continued his drunken slur.  
“I see the way people look at me, you know. The way children flinch, and other people avoid looking at me when talking to me. It’s because of my scars, I know that. I’m not a pretty sight. I thought it wouldn’t be so bad in Tortuga but… it is. And I don’t blame people, I really don’t, I don’t like my scars either. Hell, I’m even missing an ear. I’m not meant to be loved. I’m never going to experience that. That’s just how it is. I’m broken. No one wants to love anything broken.”

  
It felt like Minho’s heart had been ripped from his chest and torn to pieces. He couldn’t help but stare at Jisung. How had he missed this? How had he missed that Jisung felt that way? Didn’t Minho know him entirely, after all? Had the boy been carrying all this… all this self-hatred deep within him this whole time, so deep that Minho hadn’t been able to see it?  
“Jisung, I-“  
“You don’t have to say anything, I know it’s stupid. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said anything. It’s not your burden to bear.”  
“No, Jisung, I-“  
“I think I’m going to head for a walk, I need some fresh air.”  
“What, no-“

  
Jisung stood up from his seat and without sparing another glance at Minho. Minho felt a little hint of panic twisting inside him. No, they were in Tortuga, Jisung wasn’t one of the shadows like Minho was, he couldn’t go out alone, not in a hazy state of drunkenness and sadness and pain! Tortuga fed on vulnerable people! Quickly Minho stood up and stormed after the boy, who had already closed the tavern door behind him. In a hurry Minho left the tavern, and before him opened a quiet, nightly street of Tortuga, laden with long shadows. Moonlight painted the world around him silvery. There were a bunch of people standing around in front of the tavern.

  
“Jisung!” Minho called out, but got no answer. He couldn’t be far, he couldn’t. Minho had to get him home, or go with him, and yes, deep inside he knew he should just let the boy be and clear his head on his own, but not here, not in nightly Tortuga, not when the shadows felt all too restless and craved for blood.

  
And then Minho spotted him, turning just into an alley, and Minho hurried after him, steps turning to run.  
“Jisung!” He called out again, turned from that alley corner, sped up the last steps and grabbed him by his wrist. He spun Jisung around, and took a step back at the sight in front of him. A tear was running down his cheek, and he had an angry frown on his face.  
“What?! Can you let me be just for a while, Minho? You’re not that dependent of me, are you?” He was, and the remark stung, but Minho had to stand his ground, because the shadows were getting closer, the eerie quietness of the midnight was creeping up to them.  
“Let’s just go home, okay? You can clear your head there.”  
“No! I’m going to take a walk.”  
“Jisung”, Minho’s tone changed, just a little warning.  
“Minho. Let me go.” Minho was still holding on to his wrist. The tear on Jisung’s cheek rolled down, dropped on his shirt. Jisung pulled his wrist from Minho’s hold almost violently, and turned around again to continue his walk.  
“Jisung! Let’s just go home.” Minho felt the panic twisting to a bigger knot. He couldn’t, he really couldn’t let Jisung go.  
“Jisung!” But he got no answer, and the shadows were following, Minho could see that, they were closing in on Jisung, following after him as he walked deeper into the dark alley, and Minho didn’t want to do this, he really didn’t, but he had to, even if Jisung would hate him after that, just to keep him safe, just to keep the boy safe.

  
And so Minho gathered a little of his energy, focused them into the figure in front of him, and snapped his fingers.

  
Jisung stopped moving. Minho felt guilt engulfing him, immediately, weighing him down like anchors. He didn’t really want to put a spell on him, he really didn’t. Just for his safety. For his safety.  
“Jisung”, Minho called out again, in much gentler tone. Jisung turned around, and with fumbling feet he staggered back to Minho. He had a cloudy look in his eyes.  
“Let’s go home.” Minho took his hand, Jisung nodded.  
“Home”, he mumbled, and the guilt wrenched Minho’s heart. He snaked his other arm around Jisung’s waist, just to keep him standing, and started to lead him back home.

***

Guilt weighed Minho down first thing in the morning. He woke up, Jisung’s arm around him again, and carefully moved it away to rise from their bed. He quickly changed to his daily robes, before heading to the kitchen to make them breakfast. After he had managed to drag Jisung back to their house, he had waited for him to fall asleep before he had taken that little spell off. Minho knew Jisung would remember it, and he’d be aware of the little spell, because Minho had casted the spell that way.

  
Viola seemed agitated, she mirrored Minho’s feelings. What was the worst outcome of this? Would Jisung leave him? Would he be mad about it? He had every right to be. Minho wouldn’t blame him, he had to face the consequences.  
“Morning”, the hoarse voice from the doorway nearly made Minho drop the porcelain plate in his hand. Jisung shuffled through the door with heavy feet and sat down on the stool that was now ‘his stool’. His hair was a mess, he looked tired (like he did every morning, he wasn’t a morning person, but somehow he forced himself to wake up with Minho). Minho’s heart was pounding.  
“What?” Jisung croaked as he noticed Minho staring.

  
Many things. Minho wanted to tell Jisung many things, like that he was beautiful, with or without his scars. That he wasn’t broken. He wanted to tell him that there were people out there that loved him, very much, and Minho himself was one of them. He wanted to tell him that no other person had brought him such comfort as Jisung had. That he appreciated him. Adored him. Loved him.

  
“I- I’m sorry” was the sentence that left his mouth instead.  
“For what?” Jisung ran a hand through his locks, pushed a few black strands behind his ear. The morning glow accentuated the scars. Gorgeous.  
“For yesterday.”  
“Oh. It’s, it’s okay-“  
“No, it isn’t. I shouldn’t be casting spells on you, or any person, without consent. It’s just not right.”  
  


Jisung remained silent for a few seconds. The anxiety strained Minho’s throat.  
“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have done it. I was just…” He fiddled with the plate in his hands, looked at it, then through the window, then at Viola, then at the plate again, before he looked at Jisung again: “I was worried something would happen to you. Tortuga isn’t kind at nights. Not to vulnerable people. And I… I don’t know, I got scared you would go your own way and something would happen to you and I couldn’t get you to stay, so I… casted that spell on you. I’m sorry.”  
“It’s okay-“  
“No, it isn’t.”  
“Yes it is. Minho, I truly believe that you meant no harm with it. I’m stupid and stubborn when I’m drunk, I know that, and I remember enough, nearly everything of last night and you had every right to put that little controlling spell or whatever it was on me. You did it for my safety, didn’t you? I would have probably died out there without it.”  
Minho’s gaze lowered to the floor. He didn’t want to admit it, but there were tears pricking in his eyes for some reason. He nodded.  
“See? It’s not so bad, it didn’t hurt or anything and I was completely aware and awake the whole time, just not in control of my own actions.”

  
And for some reason, that made it all so, so much worse. And Minho knew the reason for that. He did, and that reason tightened its grip around his neck and made him squeeze the plate in his hands so hard it nearly shattered. Viola hooted worriedly in her nest.  
“Minho?” He heard Jisung calling, but his voice seemed to come somewhere far away.  
“Hey, Minho?”

  
Minho could feel the tear rolling down his cheek, then another after it. He was shaking, from the top of his head to the bottom of his feet, he was trembling. He tried to desperately blink the tears away, but that didn’t help, oh no. God, he had buried the guilt for so long and now it had sneaked back into his head. And it was even worse than before.  
“Minho, hey.”  
Minho could vaguely tell that Jisung took a hold of his shoulders, shook him a little. Minho dragged in a breath, squeezed his eyes together. More tears rolled down his cheeks, Jisung wiped them away with soft touches.  
“Minho, hey, look at me.” And Minho didn’t want to, but he was ready to do everything Jisung would ever ask him, so he did, he opened his eyes to stare into the warmth of Jisung’s brown eyes.

  
“Hey, what’s wrong?” Everything. Absolutely everything.  
“Minho? I swear, you didn’t hurt me. It’s okay, you were just protecting me, I’d trust you any day to put a spell on me.”  
Viola sounded distressed, Minho felt overwhelmed, very overwhelmed, he shook his head, tried to utter a word or two, but the tightness around his throat just didn’t let him. He took in another dragged breath, the plate slipped through his fingers and shattered against the floor. The noise it made rung in Minho’s ears deafeningly.  
“Hey, Minho, dear…” Jisung’s voice sounded like a whisper, and Minho wasn’t in control of himself and he didn’t know what to do, how to get words out of his mouth or stop the tears or anything,

  
and finally, Jisung pulled him into a hug. He wrapped his arms around Minho, pulled him in close, and Minho just… broke down. He squeezed Jisung’s shirt, knuckles white as he buried his face against his shoulder.  
“Hey, Minho, it’s okay, I’m here, you’re here, Viola is here, we’re both here”, Jisung murmured against Minho’s ear as he carefully caressed his back. Minho couldn’t help the sobs that tore through his chest almost violently.  
“I’m sorry”, he finally managed to choke out, and Jisung shushed him, only hugging him tighter.  
“I don’t blame you, Minho. You didn’t do anything bad.”  
“I’m sorry.”  
“No-“  
“I’m sorry.”  
“Minho. It’s okay, I promise, I swear on my dead ancestors’ graves, it’s okay. You have trusted me before, trust me on this one, too.”

  
That was true. Jisung had never given Minho a reason to not trust him. That comforted him, even if just a little, and with every stroke against Minho’s back, the sobs eased down, little by little, slowly but surely.  
“There, there”, Jisung whispered against his shoulder, his hold still tight around Minho. The tight, cold hand clasped around Minho’s throat started to let go of him as his sobs eased down.  
“I’m sorry I’m just-“  
“Minho…”  
“No I…” He had to explain. Jisung would ask about it, if not now, then later. It wasn’t like Minho to act so strongly about anything.

  
“I…” Minho didn’t dare to look at Jisung, he kept his head pressed against his shoulder. Jisung stayed quiet, he had understood that Minho had something to say. With voice that was barely a whisper he continued:  
“Remember when I told about the… the time when I… I poisoned that- that one guy?”  
Jisung hummed, he did.  
“I… I didn’t just poison him. I made him drink the poison with that same spell.”

  
Jisung’s movements stilled for a moment, and fear engulfed Minho once again.  
“I’m- I- I’m sorry, I, I-”, he mumbled, the panic clawed its way up again. Jisung pulled back a little, Minho gasped for air as his lungs felt like they were on fire again, and quickly the touch returned, only now Jisung wasn’t hugging him anymore, but holding his cheeks, wiping the tears away once again.  
“Minho. You told me about that guy, but you also told me that you didn’t do it in your own premises, remember? You did because of your so-called friend’s influence, am I correct?”  
Minho nodded.  
“You truly, genuinely believed they were the bad guy, right? That’s what your friend had told you. And to me it just seems like you were trying to help your friend. So, I don’t know, but to me it looks like you were under a similar kind of spell, just… not a spell. You were deceived. I truly, wholeheartedly believe you wouldn’t do such thing with bad intentions to anyone. You thought you were helping your friend back then, and now you actually were helping your friend. Who knows what would have happened if the shadows had caught up on me? This shop needs two people and I need you and you need me and we’re in this together. So stop blaming yourself for it. I don’t blame you for it. Okay?”  
“Okay”, Minho mumbled. He didn’t have the power in him to answer anything else. Maybe Jisung was right, maybe he had an ounce of truth in his speech. Minho had believed he had been doing the right thing back then, and now he had saved Jisung from whatever was lurking in the shadows.

  
One more tear fell on Minho’s cheek, and Jisung wiped it away with his thumb. He had a small, slightly sad smile on his face. Then he pulled Minho into another hug, and Minho buried his head against his shoulder once more, wrapped his arm around him and wanted to stay in that position for the rest of the day. God, he was so thankful for the boy. Where on earth would he even be without him?  
“C’mon, let’s get this plate cleaned away”, Jisung mumbled against Minho’s shoulder.

  
***

Something had shifted in the air after that morning.

  
It was something Minho had a hard time to pinpoint, but if being with Jisung had been easy before, now it had turned out to be… natural. Somehow Minho trusted him even more. Jisung hadn’t pushed him away, he didn’t hate him for what he did and had done, he didn’t think of him any differently. Or perhaps he did, something had certainly changed. Jisung asked him to run errands with him more often these days, and somehow they both understood that the other didn’t want to go anywhere anymore without the other.

  
Occasionally guilt overwhelmed him again, using that little, easy spell on Jisung had opened a lock inside of Minho that he hadn’t even known had been there. That guilt could hit him at any point of the day, sometimes behind the cash register, sometimes in the evenings, when his eyes were fixated on Jisung’s figure curled up at the other end of the sofa, and during those times Jisung held his hand again and let Minho cry against his shoulder.

  
Minho would like to think that it was in exchange for what he had done to Jisung during their first year together.

  
Minho would like to wish there was something else to it, though. Something else in the way Jisung’s fingers softly tangled into his hair as he petted his head. Something else in the way he held him, something else in the way he looked at him.

  
The way Jisung looked at him reminded Minho of three years ago. There was that same sparkle in his eyes as there had been three years ago. Minho wasn’t sure when that sparkle had appeared again, or if it had been there the whole time, but there it was again.

  
Could it be- No.

  
It couldn’t. Minho wouldn’t let himself think about it, he wouldn’t let himself fall into that false hope. He wouldn’t let himself feel it. Jisung deserved better. He deserved the best. Minho wasn’t that best.

***

“That would be twenty coins.”  
“Twenty coins?! I’m not paying twenty coins for some hoax necklace!”  
“Well, if it’s a hoax then why are you buying it?”  
“I-“  
“Exactly! If you want that lucky charm then you better pay for it!”  
“But how do I know this is real? You don’t even look like a witch.”  
“That’s because I am not the witch.”  
“Then this is a hoax!”

  
Minho chuckled lightly. He put the box filled with books down and stepped away from the shelf. He had been just filling it, as he had found a few interesting books of healing from the boutique close by, and he already owned those, so he had decided to sell them for a few coins just for some extra. People often came to look for such books from witch’s shops, that Minho had learned in the past months.

  
Minho, with quiet steps approached the arguing pair next to the counter. There was a greying man holding a little charm necklace, and Jisung was behind the counter, he looked angry. Minho circled his way behind the counter to stand next to Jisung.  
“Is there a problem?” he asked, a tiny grin tugging the corner of his mouth. He could see how the man’s demeanor changed instantly, the doubt was gone and replaced by awkwardness.  
“I, um, I was just wondering if these charms are… made by an actual witch… If they actually work”, the man stammered. Minho raised his other arm, snapped his fingers, and the candle on the counter lit up. He watched the confusion on the man’s face turn into understanding.  
“That would be twenty coins”, Minho repeated Jisung’s words.  
“Yes, twenty coins, here you go”, the man mumbled and quickly, with shaky fingers, counted the coins on the countertop before scuttling away and through the door back to the street.

  
The day had been rather quiet so far, even if Tortuga had started to draw more people in lately. The Pirate Slayer was still after the many pirate crews of the Caribbean, and more and more crews decided to stay on the shore until someone would take the ship down. Cowards. All of them. Jisung bursted into laughter as the door closed after the man, Minho’s heart fluttered.  
“Did you see the man’s face? That was so funny!”  
Minho rolled his eyes, the light grin didn’t leave his lips. It was funny, Jisung was right.

  
“Have you heard the rumors?” Jisung’s laughter died down, he hopped to sit on the countertop. There weren’t any other people in the shop, just the two of them. It was mid-day, after all, the busiest hours were still ahead of them. All in all, the shop had lost a little bit of its spark, as the joy of something new and unknown had slowly left it. Now it was just another witch’s shop at Tortuga, the only difference was that people knew that the charms bought from there really worked. Viola flied in through an open window, a little mouse in her claws. Little hunter.

  
“About the new crew?”  
“Yeah. I saw the ship. It’s bloody gorgeous, they must be rich.”  
Jisung had gone to deliver veggies to the Quartet in the morning, and had stopped by at the pier to take a look at the new ship, docked into the furthest corner. Minho had missed him the entire time he had been gone, as he himself had had to stay back to finish a few more bracelets.  
“Hmmh”, Minho hummed as he bent down again to lift the wooden box from the floor.  
“She has emerald green sails, and she’s huge! I wonder what kind of crew she has… It’s odd that no one has heard of them before.”  
“It is. Perhaps they’re from the East.”  
“Could be. I hope they stop by. What if we go search for them in the taverns today? I want to hear something about them, just a little story.” Jisung looked at Minho with those pleading eyes of his, and Minho, even if he knew he’d have to look out for basically everything because he didn’t like crowded places all that much, nodded because he was weak. Jisung could ask him to create him a ship out of thin air and Minho would do it, without hesitation.  
“Yes!” Jisung clapped his hands together, a wide smile spread on his features.

  
Too bad he didn’t know how to create ships out of thin air.

  
Minho turned his back towards Jisung as he started to hang new necklaces and bracelets on the many hooks that hung from one of the shelves. Lucky charms in one hook, strength in one, safety in one, the list went on.  
“And the tavern owner asked if we’re married. Again. I told him we’re not.”  
“Hmmh”, Minho hummed again. There were only a few necklaces left. And the rings.  
“I mean, they have asked that from us before, haven’t they? Like twice. I don’t know what it is. Are we that married? Do we act like a married couple?”  
Yes, we do. “I don’t know”, Minho mumbled.  
“I guess we do. Maybe we have to get married just so people will stop asking. I wouldn’t mind, I mean, I’ve been in love with you for over three years now, so it’s not like anything would actually change.”

  
Any and all motion in Minho’s body seemed to stop. Slowly he turned towards Jisung, mouth a little agape. Had he heard that right? He hadn’t, had he? He couldn’t have. This was just- no.

  
Jisung looked completely normal. And then his expression turned into a horrified one, as he realized what he had actually just blurted out of his mouth.  
“I- I-“

  
Minho just stared at Jisung, who stared back. If it had been a joke, Jisung would have taken it back by now, played it off, or something. Hadn’t he? That’s what he usually did, and Minho knew him. By heart.  
“I mean, I-“ Jisung stammered.  
“What?” Minho heard leaving his lips, in a quiet voice. The box slipped from his fingers, he heard it clanking against the floor, scattering the rings all around. Even Viola knew something was going on.

  
“I”, Jisung swallowed. Deep red blush dusted over his cheeks and nose.  
“I mean… I mean c’mon, Minho, there’s no way you couldn’t have noticed it. You notice everything.”  
So perhaps Minho had noticed. He had just… he had just never trusted his gut feeling about it.

  
Maybe he should have.  
“I’ve been in love with you ever since we first talked on Euryale. The day you boarded the ship. Or maybe not in love, but at least like a crush, or something, and I don’t know… then it just… turned into love I guess.” Jisung looked so small, he didn’t dare to look Minho into the eyes, simply stared at his own toes. Minho couldn’t tear his eyes away from the boy in front of him. He was in shock. His heart was pounding, he could hear it in his ears. And yet he had somehow known all of it all along, he had just been too far in his own head to accept… all of it.  
“And I get that you don’t probably like me back, I mean, I’m pretty annoying and ugly and all that but, at least now you know. That I am. In love with. You.”

  
Minho felt a thousand things at the same time, and it overwhelmed him, to the point that his hands were shaking. Jisung’s words made him so… happy? Was this that deep-rooted happiness everyone raved so much about?   
“I hope it doesn’t make you too uncomfortable. If it does I can just, uhm, leave I guess, I mean, it’s not like you really need me here…” Jisung’s voice faded out towards the end. Now his words pricked Minho in his chest, like shards of glass.  
“N-no”, he muttered, his voice sounded foreign to him. It came out quiet, so quiet Jisung didn’t hear it. Jisung looked finally up at Minho, a few seconds passed, as if he was waiting for something, and then… that little hopeful glint from his eyes disappeared.

  
And it took a moment for Minho to realize that Jisung hadn’t heard him, and he just kept on staring at him with an unreadable expression, and Jisung couldn’t possibly know what the hell was going on inside his head because he couldn’t get words out of his mouth, so he did the next best thing he could think of: with three hasty steps he closed the distance in between him and Jisung. Minho grabbed him by his shoulders, Jisung looked scared for a fraction of a moment.  
“Can I kiss you?” Minho finally asked, Jisung’s expression turned from scared to a confused one, Minho could hear the gears turning in his head; he nodded.

  
And that’s exactly what Minho did next. Kissed him. With three years of pent up feelings, with three years of longing and yearning. With three years of loving.

  
It didn’t last long, it was a hasty one, a little fumbling and Jisung was frozen and Minho had to draw back, because he could feel the words he had kept to himself for so long finally breaking free:  
“I love you too. Have loved. For a long time”, he mumbled, still holding to his shoulders as if he was afraid Jisung would disappear from his grip any second now.  
“And I don’t want you to leave. And I need you here. And Jisung, you are not annoying, you are what has kept me going for the past three years, you are the reason I found myself, and you are the one that has kept me afloat in the darkness. And I… I just wish, gods, I just wish you could see how beautiful you are, with your scars and with your quirks and with your imperfections that aren’t even imperfections. You are so beautiful to me.”

  
Jisung’s eyes were glistening.  
“I know you don’t see that yourself, but I just… I wish you did. You are so gorgeous, and you make me laugh and you light up even the darkest days just by being here and I… I love you, Jisung. I really do. I have done for quite some time now. Ever since I saved you from drowning, I think.” Minho swallowed. He waited for Jisung to say something, anything, but the boy just kept opening and closing his mouth, as a tear rolled down his cheek.

  
“You do?” he finally whispered, he couldn’t believe it, could he?  
“Yes”, Minho answered, and he could feel the familiar warmth spreading in his chest once again. Minho let go of Jisung’s shoulder with his one hand, and with that hand he gently swiped that lone tear away from Jisung’s cheek, just above the scar slitting through his features.  
“Can I?” Minho asked, and a little hesitantly, Jisung nodded.

  
Gently, with a feathery touch Minho traced the scar from above Jisung’s forehead to his browbone, down to his cheek, where the wound had once been the deepest. The skin underneath his fingers felt rough. Another tear escaped on Jisung’s cheek, Minho swiped that away, too. Then another fell, one the other side, and Minho let that be, because he continued his travel down to Jisung’s lips, where the scar slit through his upper lip, creating a little cleft right next to his cupid’s bow. Down, to his lower lip, to his chin, where the scar faded away. Of course, that one was not the only scar the years of piracy had left on Jisung, oh no, there were multiple smaller scars, that weren’t so visible to the eye. Not, when the one slitting through his face was so prominent, still red, even if it was already years old.

  
Minho pressed a kiss on Jisung’s cheek where the scar was the deepest. Then he pressed another one on his forehead, on the high of his cheekbone on the other side, where there was another deep scar. Then he moved the hairs away on the left side of Jisung’s face, and pressed another kiss on the scar his ear had left behind. An airy giggle escaped from Jisung’s chest, as the touch tickled him.

  
Minho finally wrapped his arms around Jisung, he pulled him into a tight hug, as if trying to convince with that hug to Jisung that there was so incredibly much to love in him. Jisung answered to the hug, a few heartbeats later. He still couldn’t believe this situation, could he? He had thought he stood no chance, that Minho didn’t return his feelings all these years. And Minho had been just the same.  
“So, we have gone for three years without saying anything? When we could have been properly together this whole time?” Of course Jisung was trying to turn this into a joke. Minho hummed:  
“We are quite something.”  
“We are dumb, you mean?”  
“That, too.”

  
Another light giggle from Jisung, which simply melted Minho’s heart. For a moment he just looked Jisung deep into his eyes, so warm and familiar. Home. His eyes felt like home. His embrace felt like home. No wonder Minho had been so at peace for the last three years, he found his way, without even knowing that. It had never been the places that had made themselves feel like home, it had been Jisung’s presence all along.

  
Jisung lifted one of his hands and brushed a few strands of hair away from Minho’s face. He seemed to examine him for a moment, before he breathed out a:  
“Can I?”  
“Yes”, Minho answered, and Jisung took a gentle hold of Minho’s cheek as he pulled him into another kiss.

  
Minho’s eyes fluttered close. This time the kiss was much more languid, much more certain, and much more… loving. It wasn’t cautious anymore, not fumbling, not afraid of the other. Minho felt the grip around him tighten, just a hint, and he did the same. Jisung’s lips were soft against his own, a little chapped perhaps, but just… perfect. He smelled like home, he smelled of their shared bedsheets, early mornings and the shop surrounding them. Minho hugged him tighter, he didn’t want to let go of the boy in his arms.

  
Until he had to, because he was running out of breath. Jisung was the first one to pull back. Minho pressed their foreheads together, eyes still closed, Jisung leaned against the touch. He sniffled, just a little:  
“I think we are a little married.”  
“Yeah, we are a little married. Probably have been for a while now”, Minho answered, laughter tugging the corner of his mouth, the quirk of his eyebrow. Viola hooted softly from on top of one of the shelves, where she had made herself another little nest. Minho pulled Jisung, who was still sitting on that countertop, into another hug. He breathed in him, just him, pressed his forehead against his shoulder.

  
Yeah, he was in love, and a little married, apparently. And so damn relieved. He felt free. Minho felt free, he could finally let his love take space for itself. He wasn’t the only one with his love, Jisung loved him, too, he really did.

  
Maybe Minho wasn’t such an unlovable, wretched thing that he had always believed himself to be. If Jisung could, after seeing Minho at his most vulnerable state, after learning his darkest secrets, could still love him after all that, then maybe he could… accept it. Accept that he, too, could be loved, and love in turn.

  
“Now we don’t have to lie to the neighbors anymore that we aren’t married!” Jisung mumbled against Minho’s shoulder, and a little laugh bubbled up from Minho’s chest. No, they wouldn’t have to.  
“Actually, you know what, I think the tavern owner knew something of us that we didn’t.”  
“That could be possible.”

  
Suddenly, the doorbell rang, Minho quickly pulled back, just a bit, he still had his other arm wrapped around Jisung.

  
And for the second time for that day, his blood seemed to seize in his veins.

  
“What the hell?!” he heard a familiar yell, laced deeply with confusion. At the doorway stood a familiar figure.  
“Jeongin?!” Jisung shrieked from next to Minho.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> jisung: its rotten work  
> minho: not to me. not if its you. 
> 
> so here we are once again, at the end of this story, and what a journey has it been! goddamn it took these bitches three years to get themselves together! it may or may not be my fault! anyways, once again, thank you all so much for reading this and letting me know your thoughts via comments, it's always such a pleasure to receive them!! thank you all for giving me a chance to share this story with you, and thank you for you support and loving and all that and ahh!! i'm a lil overwhelmed, i love you all!! 
> 
> i know someone is going to ask about this, so i may as well answer it here - i don't know if there will be more installments to this universe as of now. i do have a desire to write one more thing, just a glimpse to the future after all this sadness, but as of right now i don't have time to write more for this universe. however, this is not me saying i'll never write it, just... not now. maybe in half a year, when i'm a little less busy or something (and with that, please do tell in the comments or in my curiouscat if you would like to see this glimpse to the future from changlix's pov or seungjin's pov, as it could be told from either of their povs). 
> 
> anyways, thank you all for once again sailing with me through the caribbean seas, i hope it was just as much a joy to you as it was to me! i love you all, mwah! 
> 
> [twitter](https://twitter.com/dulcetchan)  
> [curiouscat](https://curiouscat.me/dulcetchan)


	4. Epilogue

Calliope was a gorgeous ship. Elegant. Shrouded in mystery. The dark wooden deckboards creaked ever so slightly underneath Jisung’s weight, as he made his way from the forecastle towards the back of the ship. It was night-time, the emerald green sails had been taken down for the night, as they had decided to stay in a little bay somewhere along the Cuban coastline. No point in sailing as they really had nowhere to go.

  
It had been a week. A week ago Jeongin had dashed in through the painter’s shop’s door and startled Jisung and Minho, waking them up from their little loving slumber. After that Chan had crashed through the door, Seungmin and Changbin right after him. Jisung had been overwhelmed, to say the least, he had nearly blacked out, but Minho had kept him awake, and then he had bursted out crying right then and there.

  
Embarrassing? Maybe a little. Understandable? That, too.

  
Not that Jisung still really could believe it. They were alive – all of them. Well, nearly all of them. Apparently Hyunjin was dead, Seungmin had found him after the explosion, and he hadn’t breathed, so he had let him go. Sad, it really was. It wrenched Jisung’s insides, but not as badly as it had done. He had already told his goodbyes to Hyunjin a little under three years ago, as he had told everyone else.

  
All the others just were suddenly alive.

  
Of course, Felix was still missing, too. None of them had heard of him, but according to Chan it was a good thing. “We would know if he was dead. We would have heard something”, that’s what he had said, and Jisung had no reason to doubt that.

  
Jisung still couldn’t believe it. He was on a ship again – no, he was on a ship with his dearest friends again. His dearest friends, or some of them, were alive. They were alive! Alive! Alive, living, breathing, not fish food. Jisung was so happy he felt like bursting. He hadn’t felt this happy in ages.

  
Or perhaps he had. Viola hooted, she was flying around the masts as a little nightly stretch. She was accompanying Jisung, he knew it, it was always like this, if Minho wasn’t with him, then Viola was.

  
The thought of Minho brought a little smile on Jisung’s face, as it always did. Perhaps Jisung indeed had felt such happiness he felt right now, in the midst of painting their little house in Tortuga and sailing across the Caribbean on some odd ships. Jisung had learned to associate Minho with happiness, as he had been the one to pull Jisung through his grieving haze two years ago.

  
And then there was that whole love thing. And now Jisung felt kiddy and happy and he wanted to yell and dance and kiss Minho silly. But he couldn’t. Because Minho was asleep in their little cabin (yes, they had got their own little cabin, which was originally meant for just Minho, but Minho wouldn’t go anywhere without Jisung, so now it was Jisung’s cabin, too), on their little bed (yes, they had dragged their bed from the painter’s shop to the ship, because there were only mattresses and hammocks left and Minho wanted to sleep next to Jisung, and yes, that made Jisung incredibly happy).

  
Minho actually, really liked him. That was just. Wow. Jisung couldn’t really believe that either. In the span of one hour he had got everything he ever needed from the world. Minho, some love, and his friends back. Jisung really hoped he wouldn’t have to return all those good things to the world any time soon.

  
The shrouds creaked, Jisung sighed. The waves on the shoreline sounded hollow, as nearly everything did these days. It was the ear, Jisung knew it, he had learned to live with it. He just wasn’t the best swordsman anymore, and that irked him. He was good, still, but Chan had announced that he wouldn’t take place in the first waves at the heists, as those were the most dangerous ones. Sad. Minho had been pleased about that, though. So maybe Jisung should be, too. Okay, perhaps it was better indeed, Jisung hadn’t been really keen on sword fights ever since… that night.

  
That night, when everything had changed. Jisung sighed again, pushed a few strands of hair away from his face. Everything had changed. Everything was the same, but everything had changed, too. There was no Captain Seo anymore, there was Captain Bang now. Or Captain Chan. Chan didn’t really prefer one over the other. Then there was a witch on their ship, there had been one previously, too, but now everyone just… knew about Minho. And it made Jisung so happy, because Minho was clearly feeling better about himself, too, as the others around them accepted him. And if Minho was happy, then so was Jisung.

  
Seungmin’s eyes had got sadder. He didn’t really laugh at all anymore. His comments were even snarkier, bordering on hurtful. “Give him time”, that’s what Chan had said, and Jisung had nodded. Seungmin had lost so much. Too much. He had every right to be angry at the world.

  
Jeongin was the only one that hadn’t actually changed much. He had got taller. And wiser, perhaps, he had always been the wise one, the bright one, so Jisung really didn’t know if he had got any wiser. Was it even possible? Probably not. The lilac of his eyes was slightly deeper nowadays, too. And Viola really liked him.

  
And then there was Changbin.

  
Jisung swallowed, he let his fingers dance against the wooden railing of the ship. They hadn’t really talked. Jisung didn’t really know how. They had hugged, sure, Changbin had hugged him so hard that he had nearly cracked Jisung’s spine when they had first met. And after that there had been a few awkward smiles and glances. And that’s it. Nothing else. And Jisung really didn’t know… he just didn’t know what to do.

  
“Why are you up?” The voice startled Jisung, he gasped as he turned around. Viola sensed the change in his mood and immediately landed on his shoulder, just to protect Jisung of whoever had scared him.   
“Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.” Changbin was standing in front of the kitchen door with a lit lantern in his hand. Jisung glanced at the door. Was this his chance?   
“Had fun with a little night snacking? Won’t Seungmin beat your ass?” Jisung tried his best to crack a smile. Something akin to laughter flashed in Changbin’s eyes, before the… numbness took over again.   
“No, I was just… spending time with Seungmin.”   
“Oh?” Huh?   
“It’s uh… It’s been exactly three years since…”   
“Oh.”

And now Jisung felt like a goddamn idiot.   
“Oh, I’m… I’m sorry, I didn’t realize…” Jisung bit his lower lip. A gentle smile tugged the corners of Changbin’s lips:   
“It’s alright. I don’t think anyone else knows but… me and Seungmin.”   
Of course. They hadn’t got their loved ones back. Of course they knew the time, and how many days and years had passed since then. Jisung wanted to fling himself into the seas.

  
“But why are you up? Aren’t you supposed to be awake with the sun for your look-out shift?” Changbin took a few steps closer. This was the most they had talked ever since… well, forever.   
“Oh, I just couldn’t sleep.”   
Viola hooted as an affirmation. The little grin tugged Changbin’s lips again: “I know that feeling.”

  
And then the awkward silence deepened again. Jisung fiddled with the hem of his shirt. Changbin changed his weight from one leg to the other. Viola tugged a few strands of Jisung’s hair. She was clearly telling Jisung to do something.   
“Changbin, I-“  
“Jisung, I’m sorry.”

  
Jisung shut his mouth at that. And then he opened it again:  
“No, I’m sorry.”   
“No, I am sorry”, Changbin insisted.   
“It’s been three years, it’s alright, I mean-“   
“No, it’s not.” Changbin took a few steps forward, until he reached the railing of the ship. He placed the lantern next to Jisung, in between them. Then he turned to face Jisung, and Jisung saw pain in his eyes.   
“I’m sorry. I acted like an ass, but I didn’t do it because I wanted to.”

  
Huh?   
“What do you mean?” Jisung asked.   
“I… You remember how my father was towards the end, right? He was… paranoid. And trying to get me to be the next captain.”   
Jisung nodded. He remembered. Captain Seo had once been high and mighty, but not during his last year of living.   
“He… He told me to cut all the ties with you. All of them. If I didn’t do that, he told me he would throw you overboard. And I knew he was capable of doing exactly that so… that’s what I did. I acted like an ass towards you. And all the others. I’m sorry. I should have told you how the things were, but I was just… afraid he would somehow find out.”

  
What the fuck?   
“Yeah, you should have told me.” Seriously, Jisung, that’s all you’re going to say? Jisung mentally smacked himself in the face, c’mon now, that’s your bestie of many years in front of you confessing that he didn’t actually hate you!   
“I mean, I mean… Wow, I thought you started to hate me because of Felix.”   
Changbin’s expression turned to a slightly shocked one, before it bled back to an apologetic one.   
“Gods, no! I actually told him what was up, and he was going to talk to you but you, uh… well, he couldn’t get to you.”

  
No wonder, Jisung had acted like an ass back then, too.   
“I’m sorry”, Jisung blurted out: “I’m sorry for acting like a bloody bastard, too. I was just… confused, I guess. And sad. And a little hurt. And you’re forgiven. Jesus, I thought you still hated me.” Jisung could feel the pressure slowly lifting from his chest. Changbin didn’t hate him. Hadn’t hated him. It was just his father – man, fuck that Captain Seo guy! Jisung had lost his bestie because of him!   
Changbin looked serious:   
“I wouldn’t hate you. I have never hated you. You were my best friend.”

  
A few heartbeats of silence.

  
“And you are still my best friend. If you want to be.”

  
Jisung took in a breath. He swallowed the lump forming in his throat down.

  
And then he grabbed Changbin by his arm and pulled him into a tight hug. All the tension seemed to leave him, he could breathe again.   
“I missed you so bad”, he whispered against Changbin’s shoulder. He could feel Changbin’s arms enveloping him into the hug, squeezing the breath out of him.   
“I missed you, too. So freaking much”, Changbin mumbled back. They stayed like that just for a while, Jisung felt relief washing over him, and perhaps a little tear escaped from his eye and dropped on the soft fabric of Changbin’s shirt. Gods, had he missed his best friend. So incredibly much.

  
Viola hooted softly, and that made Jisung finally pull back. Changbin’s eyes sparkled in the moonlight as well, so Jisung clearly wasn’t the only one crying. The only one feeling a hundred different things, relief above all of them. Jisung sniffled just a bit, before freeing laughter bubbled up from his chest. Changbin giggled lightly as well, before he took the lantern from the railing.

  
The ice between them had finally been broken.

  
And now everything, everything in between Jisung and Changbin was back to normal. Back to the way it had been. Jisung could feel it. It made him so incredibly happy. Changbin didn’t hate him, he had missed him, just as badly as Jisung had missed Changbin.

  
God, he would never ever let anyone get in between them ever again!

  
“Well, quartermaster. You and the captain have been awfully quiet about our next heading, mind enlightening your bestie a little?”   
Changbin snorted at him, before that oh-so-familiar grin tugged the corners of his mouth again.   
“Have you heard of the Pirate Slayer? We would like to see it gone. And after that, we still have some unfinished business in Nassau.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> someone once said that they would like to read about changbin's and jisung's reunion, so here it is, as a little epilogue! and with that, i bid a short farewell to you all, i hope to meet you again with my upcoming stories in the somewhat near future! 
> 
> [twitter](https://twitter.com/dulcetchan)   
>  [curiouscat](https://curiouscat.me/dulcetchan)

**Author's Note:**

> [twitter](https://twitter.com/dulcetchan)   
>  [curiouscat](https://curiouscat.me/dulcetchan)


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